B 


UNCL 

l 

>*H. 


UNIVERSITY  OF  N.C.  AT  CHAPEL  HILL 


00008828593 


C6e  Ht&rarg 

of  i&e 

Slntoetsitg  of  JSortfi  Carolina 


%W  &ooft  toag  printed 


THE  LIBRARY  OF  THE 

UNIVERSITY  OF 

NORTH  CAROLINA 


Presented  by 
Etbe"»  bert  Stewart 


8lli 
E53Le 


^ifcer^itme  attrition 


LECTURES  AND   BIOGRAPHICAL 
SKETCHES 

BEING  VOLUME  X. 

OF 

EMERSON'S  COMPLETE  WORKS 


Digitized  by  the  Internet  Archive 

in  2011  with  funding  from 

University  of  North  Carolina  at  Chapel  Hill 


http://www.archive.org/details/lecturesbiographemer 


LECTURES 


AND 


BIOGRAPHICAL   SKETCHES 


BY 


RALPH  WALDO  EMERSON 


BOSTON 

HOUGHTON,  MIFFLIN   AND    COMPANY 

New  York:   11  East  Seventeenth  Street 

I895 


\s 


0  \ 

r     I     .  j  I 

-       ■ 


Copyright,  1883, 
Br  EDWARD  W.  EMERSOH 

.4^  ri^Afs  reserved. 


The  Riverside  Press,  Cambridge,  Mass.,  TJ.  S.  A. 
Electrotyped  and  Printed  by  H.  0.  Houghton  &  Company. 


NOTE. 


Of  the  pieces  included  in  this  volume  the  fol- 
lowing, namely,  those  from  the  "  Dial,"  "  Charac- 
ter," "  Plutarch,"  and  the  biographical  sketches  of 
Dr.  Ripley,  of  Mr.  Hoar,  and  of  Henry  Thoreau, 
were  printed  by  Mr.  Emerson  before  I  took  any 
part  in  the  arrangement  of  his  papers.  The  rest, 
except  the  sketch  of  Miss  Mary  Emerson,  I  got 
ready  for  his  use  in  readings  to  his  friends  or  to  a 
limited  public.  He  had  given  up  the  regular  prac- 
tice of  lecturing,  but  would  sometimes,  upon  special 
request,  read  a  paper  that  had  been  prepared  for 
him  from  his  manuscripts,  in  the  manner  described 
in  the  preface  to  "  Letters  and  Social  Aims,"  — 
some  former  lecture  serving  as  a  nucleus  for  the 
new.  Some  of  these  papers  he  afterwards  allowed 
to  be  printed;  others,  namely,  "  Aristocracy,"  "  Ed- 
ucation," "The  Man  of  Letters,"  "The  Scholar," 
"  Historic  Notes  of  Life  and  Letters  in  New  Eng- 
land," "  Mary  Moody  Emerson,"  are  now  pub- 
lished for  the  first  time. 

J.  E.  CABOT. 


CONTENTS. 

PAEG 

Bemonology 7 

Aristocracy 33 

Perpetual  Eorces 69 

Character 91 

Education 123 

The  Superlative „  157 

The  Sovereignty  of  Ethics 175 

The  Preacher 207 

The  Man  of  Letters        . 229 

The  Scholar .247 

Plutarch 275 

Historic  Notes  of  Life  and    Letters  in  New  Eng- 
land   , 305 

The  Chardon  Street  Convention 349 

Ezra  Ripley,  D.  D 355 

Mary  Moody  Emerson 371 

Samuel  Hoar 405 

Thoreau   .  419 

CARLYLE   .  -   .  o      a      .      a     a      o      453 


DEMONOLOGY. 


Night-dreams  trace  on  Memory's  wall 
Shadows  of  the  thoughts  of  day, 

And  thy  fortunes  as  they  fall 
The  bias  of  thy  will  betray. 


/ 


In  the  chamber,  on  the  stair% 

Lurking  dumb, 

Go  and  come 
Lemurs  and  Lars. 


DEMONOLOGY.i 


The  name  Demonology  covers  dreams,  omens, 
coincidences,  luck,  sortilege,  magic,  and  other  ex- 
periences which  shun  rather  than  court  inquiry,  and 
deserve  notice  chiefly  because  every  man  has  usually 
in  a  lifetime  two  or  three  hints  in  this  kind  which 
are  specially  impressive  to  him.  They  also  shed 
light  on  our  structure. 

The  witchcraft  of  sleep  divides  with  truth  the 
empire  of  our  lives.  This  soft  enchantress  visits 
two  children  lying  locked  in  each  other's  arms,  and 
carries  them  asunder  by  wide  spaces  of  land  and 
sea,  and  wide  intervals  of  time :  — 

"  There  lies  a  sleeping  city,  God  of  dreams  ! 
What  an  unreal  and  fantastic  world 
Is  going  on  below  ! 

Within  the  sweep  of  yon  encircling  wall 
How  many  a  large  creation  of  the  night, 
Wide  wilderness  and  mountain,  rock  and  sea, 
Peopled  with  busy,  transitory  groups, 
Finds  room  to  rise,  and  never  feels  the  crowd." 

1  From  the  course  of  lectures  on  "  Human  Life,"  read  in 
Boston,  1839-40.  Published  in  the  North  American  Revku^ 
1877. 


10  BEMONOLOGY. 

'T  is  superfluous  to  think  of  the  dreams  of  multi- 
tudes, the  astonishment  remains  that  one  should 
dream ;  that  we  should  resign  so  quietly  this  deify- 
ing Reason,  and  become  the  theatre  of  delirious 
shows,  wherein  time,  space,  persons,  cities,  animals, 
should  dance  before  us  in  merry  and  mad  confu- 
sion ;  a  delicate  creation  outdoing  the  prime  and 
flower  of  actual  nature,  antic  comedy  alternating 
with  horrid  pictures.  Sometimes  the  forgotten 
companions  of  childhood  reappear  :  — 

"  They  come,  in  dim  procession  led, 
The  cold,  the  faithless,  and  the  dead, 
As  warm  each  hand,  each  brow  as  gay, 
As  if  they  parted  yesterday:  "  — 

or  we  seem  busied  for  hours  and  days  in  peregrina- 
tions over  seas  and  lands,  in  earnest  dialogues, 
strenuous  actions  for  nothings  and  absurdities, 
cheated  by  spectral  jokes  and  waking  suddenly 
with  ghastly  laughter,  to  be  rebuked  by  the  cold, 
lonely,  silent  midnight,  and  to  rake  with  confusion 
in  memory  among  the  gibbering  nonsense  to  find 
the  motive  of  this  contemptible  cachinnation. 
Dreams  are  jealous  of  being  remembered ;  they 
dissipate  instantly  and  angrily  if  you  try  to  hold 
them.  When  newly  awaked  from  lively  dreams, 
we  are  so  near  them,  still  agitated  by  them,  still  in 
their  sphere,  —  give  us  one  syllable,  one  feature, 
one  hint,  and  we  should  repossess  the  whole ;  hours 


DEMONOLOGY.  11 

of  this  strange  entertainment  would  come  trooping 
back  to  us  ;  but  we  cannot  get  our  hand  on  the 
first  link  or  fibre,  and  the  whole  is  lost.  There  is 
a  strange  wilfulness  in  the  speed  with  which  it  dis- 
perses and  baffles  our  grasp. 

A  dislocation  seems  to  be  the  foremost  trait  of 
dreams.  A  painful  imperfection  almost  always  at- 
tends them.  The  fairest  forms,  the  most  noble  and 
excellent  persons,  are  deformed  by  some  pitiful  and 
insane  circumstance.  The  very  landscape  and  scen- 
ery in  a  dream  seem  not  to  fit  us,  but  like  a  coat 
or  cloak  of  some  other  person  to  overlap  and  en- 
cumber the  wearer ;  so  is  the  ground,  the  road,  the 
house,  in  dreams,  too  long  or  too  short,  and  if  it 
served  no  other  purpose  would  show  us  how  accu- 
rately nature  fits  man  awake. 

There  is  one  memory  of  waking  and  another  of 
sleep.  In  our  dreams  the  same  scenes  and  fancies 
are  many  times  associated,  and  that  too,  it  would 
seem,  for  years.  In  sleep  one  shall  travel  certain 
roads  in  stage-coaches  or  gigs,  which  he  recognizes 
as  familiar,  and  has  dreamed  that  ride  a  dozen 
times;  or  shall  walk  alone  in  familiar  fields  and 
meadows,  which  road  or  which  meadow  in  waking 
hours  he  never  looked  upon.  This  feature  of 
dreams  deserves  the  more  attention  from  its  singu- 
lar resemblance  to  that  obscure  yet  startling  expe* 
rience  which  almost  every  person  confesses  in  day. 


12  DEMONOLOGY. 

light,  that  particular  passages  of  conversation  and 
action  have  occurred  to  him  in  the  same  order  be- 
fore, whether  dreaming  or  waking ;  a  suspicion 
that  they  have  been  with  precisely  these  persons  in 
precisely  this  room,  and  heard  precisely  this  dia- 
logue, at  some  former  hour,  they  know  not  when. 

Animals  have  been  called  "  the  dreams  of  na- 
ture." Perhaps  for  a  conception  of  their  con- 
sciousness we  may  go  to  our  own  dreams.  In  a 
dream  we  have  the  instinctive  obedience,  the  same 
torpidity  of  the  highest  power,  the  same  unsur- 
prised assent  to  the  monstrous  as  these  metamor- 
phosed men  exhibit.  Our  thoughts  in  a  stable  or 
in  a  menagerie,  on  the  other  hand,  may  well  re- 
mind us  of  our  dreams.  What  compassion  do 
these  imprisoning  forms  awaken  !  You  may  catch 
the  glance  of  •  a  dog  sometimes  which  lays  a  kind 
of  claim  to  sympathy  and  brotherhood.  What ! 
somewhat  of  me  down  there  ?  Does  he  know  it  ? 
Can  he  too,  as  I,  go  out  of  himself,  see  himself, 
perceive  relations  ?  We  fear  lest  the  poor  brute 
should  gain  one  dreadful  glimpse  of  his  condition, 
should  learn  in  some  moment  the  tough  limitations 
of  this  fettering  organization.  It  was  in  this 
glance  that  Ovid  got  the  hint  of  his  metamo^ 
phoses;  Calidasa  of  his  transmigration  of  souls. 
For  these  fables  are  our  own  thoughts  carried  out. 
What   keeps  those  wild   tales   in   circulation   for 


DEMONOLOGY.  13 

thousands  of  years  ?  What  but  the  wild  fact  to 
which  they  suggest  some  approximation  of  theory  ? 
Nor  is  the  fact  quite  solitary,  for  in  varieties  of  our 
own  species  where  organization  seems  to  predom- 
inate over  the  genius  of  man,  in  Kalmuck  or  Malay 
or  Flathead  Indian,  we  are  sometimes  pained  by 
the  same  feeling  ;  and  sometimes  too  the  sharp- 
witted  prosperous  white  man  awakens  it.  In  a 
mixed  assembly  we  have  chanced  to  see  not  only  a 
glance  of  Abdiel,  so  grand  and  keen,  but  also  in 
other  faces  the  features  of  the  mink,  of  the  bull,  of 
the  rat,  and  the  barn-door  fowl.  You  think,  could 
the  man  overlook  his  own  condition,  he  could  not 
be  restrained  from  suicide. 

Dreams  have  a  poetic  integrity  and  truth.  This 
limbo  and  dust-hole  of  thought  is  presided  over  by 
a  certain  reason,  too.  Their  extravagance  from 
nature  is  yet  within  a  higher  nature.  They  seem 
to  us  to  suggest  an  abundance  and  fluency  of 
thought  not  familiar  to  the  waking  experience. 
They  pique  us  by  independence  of  us,  yet  we  know 
ourselves  in  this  mad  crowd,  and  owe  to  dreams  a 
kind  of  divination  and  wisdom.  My  dreams  are 
not  me  ;  they  are  not  Nature,  or  the  Not-me  :  they 
are  both.  They  have  a  double  consciousness,  at 
once  sub-  and  ob-jective.  We  call  the  phantoms 
that  rise,  the  creation  of  our  fancy,  but  they  act 
ike  mutineers,  and  fire  on  their  commander ;  show 


14  DEMONOLOGY. 

ing  that  every  act,  every  thought,  every  cause,  is  bi- 
polar, and  in  the  act  is  contained  the  counteraction. 
If  I  strike,  I  am  struck ;  if  I  chase,  I  am  pursued. 

Wise  and  sometimes  terrible  hints  shall  in  them 
be  thrown  to  the  man  out  of  a  quite  unknown  intel- 
ligence. He  shall  be  startled  two  or  three  times  in 
his  life  by  the  justice  as  well  as  the  significance  of 
this  phantasmagoria.  Once  or  twice  the  conscious 
fetters  shall  seem  to  be  unlocked,  and  a  freer  utter- 
ance attained.  A  prophetic  character  in  all  ages 
has  haunted  them.  They  are  the  maturation  often 
of  opinions  not  consciously  carried  out  to  statements, 
but  whereof  we  already  possessed  the  elements. 
Thus,  when  awake,  I  know  the  character  of  Rupert, 
but  do  not  think  what  he  may  do.  In  dreams  I  see 
him  engaged  in  certain  actions  which  seem  prepos- 
terous, —  out  of  all  fitness.  He  is  hostile,  he  is 
cruel,  he  is  frightful,  he  is  a  poltroon.  It  turns  out 
prophecy  a  year  later.  But  it  was  already  in  my 
mind  as  character,  and  the  sibyl  dreams  merely 
embodied  it  in  fact.  Why  then  should  not  symp- 
toms, auguries,  forebodings  be,  and,  as  one  said, 
the  moanings  of  the  spirit  ? 

We  are  let  by  this  experience  into  the  high 
region  of  Cause,  and  acquainted  with  the  identity 
of  very  unlike-seeming  effects.  We  learn  that  ac- 
tions whose  turpitude  is  very  differently  reputed 
proceed  from  one  and  the  same  affection.     Sleep 


DEMONOLOGY.  15 

takes  off  the  costume  of  circumstance,  arms  us  with 
terrible  freedom,  so  that  every  will  rushes  to  a 
deed.  A  skilful  man  reads  his  dreams  for  his  self- 
knowledge  ;  yet  not  the  details,  but  the  quality. 
What  part  does  he  play  in  them,  —  a  cheerful, 
manly  part,  or  a  poor  drivelling  part  ?  However 
monstrous  and  grotesque  their  apparitions,  they 
have  a  substantial  truth.  The  same  remark  may 
be  extended  to  the  omens  and  coincidences  which 
may  have  astonished  us.  Of  all  it  is  true  that 
the  reason  of  them  is  always  latent  in  the  individual. 
Goethe  said  :  "  These  whimsical  pictures,  inasmuch 
as  they  originate  from  us,  may  well  have  an  anal- 
ogy with  our  whole  life  and  fate." 

The  soul  contains  in  itself  the  event  that  shall 
presently  befall  it,  for  the  event  is  only  the  actual- 
izing of  its  thoughts.  It  is  no  wonder  that  partic- 
ular dreams  and  presentiments  should  fall  out  and 
be  prophetic.  The  fallacy  consists  in  selecting  a 
few  insignificant  hints  when  all  are  inspired  with 
the  same  sense.  As  if  one  should  exhaust  his  aston- 
ishment at  the  economy  of  his  thumb-nail,  and  over- 
look the  central  causal  miracle  of  his  being  a  man. 
Every  man  goes  through  the  world  attended  with 
innumerable  facts  prefiguring  (yes,  distinctly  an- 
nouncing) his  fate,  if  only  eyes  of  sufficient  heed 
and  illumination  were  fastened  on  the  sign.  The 
sign  is  always  there,  if  only  the  eye  were  also :  just 


16  DEMONOLOGY. 

as  under  every  tree  in  the  speckled  sunshine  and 
shade  no  man  notices  that  every  spot  of  light  is  a 
perfect  image  of  the  sun,  until  in  some  hour  the 
moon  eclipses  the  luminary ;  and  then  first  we  notice 
that  the  spots  of  light  have  become  crescents,  or 
annular,  and  correspond  to  the  changed  figure  of 
the  sun.  Things  are  significant  enough,  Heaven 
knows  ;  but  the  seer  of  the  sign,  —  where  is  he  ? 
We  doubt  not  a  man's  fortune  may  be  read  in  the 
lines  of  his  hand,  by  palmistry ;  in  the  lines  of  his 
face,  by  physiognomy  ;  in  the  outlines  of  the  skull, 
by  craniology :  the  lines  are  all  there,  but  the 
reader  waits.  The  long  waves  indicate  to  the  in- 
structed mariner  that  there  is  no  near  land  in  the 
direction  from  which  they  come.  Belzoni  describes 
the  three  marks  which  led  him  to  dig  for  a  door  to 
the  pyramid  of-Ghizeh.  What  thousands  had  be- 
held the  same  spot  for  so  many  ages,  and  seen  no 
three  marks  ! 

Secret  analogies  tie  together  the  remotest  parts 
of  nature,  as  the  atmosphere  of  a  summer  morning 
is  filled  with  innumerable  gossamer  threads  run- 
ning in  every  direction,  revealed  by  the  beams  of 
the  rising  sun.  All  life,  all  creation,  is  tell-tale 
and  betraying.  A  man  reveals  himself  in  every 
glance  and  step  and  movement  and  rest :  — 

"  Head  with  foot  hath  private  amity, 
And  both  with  moons  and  tides." 


DEHONOLOGY.  17 

Not  a  mathematical  axiom  but  is  a  moral  rule. 
The  jest  and  byword  to  an  intelligent  ear  extends 
its  meaning  to  the  soul  and  to  all  time.  Indeed,  all 
productions  of  man  are  so  anthropomorphous  that 
not  possibly  can  he  invent  any  fable  that  shall  not 
have  a  deep  moral  and  be  true  in  senses  and  to  an 
extent  never  intended  by  the  inventor.  Thus  all 
the  bravest  tales  of  Homer  and  the  poets,  modern 
philosophers  can  explain  with  profound  judgment 
of  law  and  state  and  ethics.  Lucian  has  an  idle 
tale  that  Pancrates,  journeying  from  Memphis  to 
Coppus,  and  wanting  a  servant,  took  a  door-bar 
and  pronounced  over  it  magical  words,  and  it  stood 
up  and  brought  him  water,  and  turned  a  spit,  and 
carried  bundles,  doing  all  the  work  of  a  slave. 
What  is  this  but  a  prophecy  of  the  progress  of  art  ? 
For  Pancrates  write  Watt  or  Fulton,  and  for 
"magical  words  "  write  "  steam  ;"  and  clo  they  not 
make  an  iron  bar  and  half  a  dozen  wheels  do  the 
work,  not  of  one,  but  of  a  thousand  skilful  me- 
chanics ? 

"  Nature,5'  said  Swedenborg,  "  makes  almost  as 
much  demand  on  our  faith  as  miracles  do."  And 
I  find  nothing  in  fables  more  astonishing  than  my 
experience  in  every  hour.  One  moment  of  a  man's 
life  is  a  fact  so  stupendous  as  to  take  the  lustre  out 
of  all  fiction.  The  lovers  of  marvels,  of  what  we 
call  the  occult  and  unproved  sciences,  of  mesmer- 

VOL.   S.  2 


18  DEMONOLOGY. 

ism,  of  astrology,  of  coincidences,  of  intercourse, 
by  writing  or  by  rapping  or  by  painting,  with  de- 
parted spirits,  need  not  reproach  us  with  incredu- 
lity because  we  are  slow  to  accept  their  statement. 
It  is  not  the  incredibility  of  the  fact,  but  a  certain 
want  of  harmony  between  the  action  and  the  agents. 
We  are  used  to  vaster  wonders  than  these  that  are 
alleged.  In  the  hands  of  poets,  of  devout  and  sim- 
ple minds,  nothing  in  the  line  of  their  character 
and  genius  would  surprise  us.  But  we  should  look 
for  the  style  of  the  great  artist  in  it,  look  for  com- 
pleteness and  harmony.  Nature  never  works  like 
a  conjuror,  to  surprise,  rarely  by  shocks,  but  by 
infinite  graduation  ;  so  that  we  live  embosomed  in 
sounds  we  do  not  hear,  scents  we  do  not  smell,  spec- 
tacles we  see  not,  and  by  innumerable  impressions 
so  softly  laid  on  that  though  important  we  do  not 
discover  them  until  our  attention  is  called  to  them. 
For  Spiritism,  it  shows  that  no  man  almost  is  fit 
to  give  evidence.  Then  I  say  to  the  amiable  and 
sincere  among  them,  these  matters  are  quite  too  im- 
portant than  that  I  can  rest  them  on  any  legends. 
If  I  have  no  facts,  as  you  allege,  I  can  very  well 
wait  for  them.  I  am  content  and  occupied  with 
such  miracles  as  I  know,  such  as  my  eyes  and  ears 
daily  show  me,  such  as  humanity  and  astronomy. 
If  any  others  are  important  to  me  they  will  cer- 
tainly be  shown  to  me. 


DEMONOLOGY.  19 

In  times  most  credulous  of  these  fancies  the  sense 
was  always  met  and  the  superstition  rebuked  by  the 
grave  spirit  of  reason  and  humanity.  When  Hec- 
tor is  told  that  the  omens  are  unpropitious,  he  re- 
plies, — 

"  One  omen  is  the  best,  to  fight  for  one's  country." 

Euripides  said,  "  He  is  not  the  best  prophet  who 
guesses  well,  and  he  is  not  the  wisest  man  whose 
guess  turns  out  well  in  the  event,  but  he  who,  what- 
ever the  event  be,  takes  reason  and  probability  for 
his  guide."  "  Swans,  horses,  dogs  and  dragons," 
says  Plutarch,  "  we  distinguish  as  sacred,  and  vehi- 
cles of  the  Divine  foresight,  and  yet  we  cannot  be- 
lieve that  men  are  sacred  and  favorites  of  Heaven." 
The  poor  shipmaster  discovered  a  sound  theology, 
when  in  the  storm  at  sea  he  made  his  prayer  to 
Neptune,  "  O  God,  thou  mayst  save  me  if  thou 
wilt,  and  if  thou  wilt  thou  mayst  destroy  me  ;  but, 
however,  I  will  hold  my  rudder  true."  Let  me  add 
one  more  example  of  the  same  good  sense,  in  a 
story  quoted  out  of  Hecateus  of  Abdera  :  — 

"  As  I  was  once  travelling  by  the  Red  Sea,  there  was 
one  among  the  horsemen  that  attended  us  named  Masol- 
lam,  a  brave  and  strong  man,  and  according  to  the  tes- 
timony of  all  the  Greeks  and  barbarians,  a  very  skilful 
archer.  Now  while  the  whole  multitude  was  on  the 
way,  an  augur  called  out  to  them  to  stand  still,  and  this 
man  inquired  the  reason  of  their  halting.     The  augur 


20  DEMONOLOGY. 

showed  him  a  bird,  and  told  him,  '  If  that  bird  remained 
where  he  was,  it  would  be  better  for  them  all  to  remain ; 
if  he  flew  on,  they  might  proceed  ;  but  if  he  flew  back 
they  must  return.'  The  Jew  said  nothing,  but  bent  his 
bow  and  shot  the  bird  to  the  ground.  This  act  offended 
the  augur  and  some  others,  and  they  began  to  utter  im- 
precations against  the  Jew.  But  he  replied,  'Where- 
fore ?  Why  are  you  so  foolish  as  to  take  care  of  this 
unfortunate  bird  ?  How  could  this  fowl  give  us  any 
wise  directions  respecting  our  journey,  when  he  could 
not  save  his  own  life  ?  Had  he  known  anything  of  fu- 
turity, he  would  not  have  come  here  to  be  killed  by  the 
arrow  of  Masollam  the  Jew.' " 

It  is  not  the  tendency  of  our  times  to  ascribe  im- 
portance to  whimsical  pictures  of  sleep,  or  to 
omens.  But  the  faith  in  peculiar  and  alien  power 
takes  another  form  in  the  modern  mind,  much  more 
resembling  the  ancient  doctrine  of  the  guardian 
genius.  The  belief  that  particular  individuals  are 
attended  by  a  good  fortune  which  makes  them  de- 
sirable associates  in  any  enterprise  of  uncertain 
success,  exists  not  only  among  those  who  take  part 
in  political  and  military  projects,  but  influences  all 
joint  action  of  commerce  and  affairs,  and  a  cor- 
responding assurance  in  the  individuals  so  dis- 
tinguished meets  and  justifies  the  expectation  of 
others  by  a  boundless  self -trust.  "  I  have  a  lucky 
hand,  sir,"  said  Napoleon  to  his  hesitating  Chan- 


DEMONOLOGY.  21 

cellor;  "those  on  whom  I  lay  it  are  fit  for  any- 
thing." This  faith  is  familiar  in  one  form,  —  that 
often  a  certain  abdication  of  prudence  and  foresight 
is  an  element  of  success  ;  that  children  and  young 
persons  come  off  safe  from  casualties  that  would 
have  proved  dangerous  to  wiser  people.  We  do 
not  think  the  young  will  be  forsaken  ;  but  he  is 
fast  approaching  the  age  when  the  sub-miraculous 
external  protection  and  leading  are  withdrawn  and 
he  is  committed  to  his  own  care.  The  young  man 
takes  a  leap  in  the  dark  and  alights  safe.  As  he 
comes  into  manhood  he  remembers  passages  and 
persons  that  seem,  as  he  looks  at  them  now,  to 
have  been  supernaturally  deprived  of  injurious  in- 
fluence on  him.  His  eyes  were  holden  that  he 
could  not  see.  But  he  learns  that  such  risks  he 
may  no  longer  run.  He  observes,  with  pain,  not 
that  he  incurs  mishaps  here  and  there,  but  that  his 
genius,  whose  invisible  benevolence  was  tower  and 
shield  to  him,  is  no  longer  present  and  active. 

In  the  popular  belief,  ghosts  are  a  selecting  tribe, 
avoiding  millions,  speaking  to  one.  In  our  tradi- 
tions, fairies,  angels  and  saints  show  the  like  favor- 
itism; so  do  the  agents  and  the  means  of  magic, 
as  sorcerers  and  amulets.  This  faith  in  a  doting- 
power,  so  easily  sliding  into  the  current  belief 
everywhere,  and,  in  the  particular  of  lucky  days 
and  fortunate  persons,  as  frequent  in  America  to- 


22  DEMONOLOGY. 

day  as  the  faith  in  incantations  and  philters  was  in 
old  Rome,  or  the  wholesome  potency  of  the  sign  of 
the  cross  in  modern  Rome,  —  this  supposed  power 
runs  athwart  the  recognized  agencies,  natural  and 
moral,  which  science  and  religion  explore.  Heeded 
though  it  be  in  many  actions  and  partnerships,  it 
is  not  the  power  to  which  we  build  churches,  or 
make  liturgies  and  prayers,  or  which  we  regard  in 
passing  laws,  or  found  college  professorships  to  ex- 
pound. Goethe  has  said  in  his  Autobiography 
what  is  much  to  the  purpose  :  — 

"  I  believed  that  I  discovered  in  nature,  animate  and 
inanimate,  intelligent  and  brute,  somewhat  which  mani- 
fested itself  only  in  contradiction,  and  therefore  could 
not  be  grasped  by  a  conception,  much  less  by  a  word. 
It  was  not  god-like,  since  it  seemed  unreasonable ;  not 
human,  since  it  had  no  understanding;  not  devilish, 
since  it  was  beneficent ;  not  angelic,  since  it  is  often  a 
marplot.  It  resembled  chance,  since  it  showed  no  se- 
quel. It  resembled  Providence,  since  it  pointed  at  con- 
nection. All  which  limits  us  seemed  permeable  to  that. 
It  seemed  to  deal  at  pleasure  with  the  necessary  ele- 
ments of  our  constitution  ;  it  shortened  time  and  ex- 
tended space.  Only  in  the  impossible  it  seemed  to  de- 
light, and  the  possible  to  repel  with  contempt.  This, 
which  seemed  to  insert  itself  between  all  other  things, 
to  sever  them,  to  bind  them,  I  named  the  Demoniacal, 
after  the  example  of  the  ancients,  and  of  those  who  had 
observed  the  like. 


DEMONOLOGY.  23 

"Although  every  demoniacal  property  can  manifest 
itself  in  the  corporeal  and  incorporeal,  yes,  in  beasts  too 
in  a  remarkable  manner,  yet  it  stands  specially  in  won- 
derful relations  with  men,  and  forms  in  the  moral  world, 
though  not  an  antagonist,  yet  a  transverse  element,  so 
that  the  former  may  be  called  the  warp,  the  latter  the 
woof.  For  the  phenomena  which  hence  originate  there 
are  countless  names,  since  all  philosophies  and  religions 
have  attempted  in  prose  or  in  poetry  to  solve  this  riddle, 
and  to  settle  the  thing  once  for  all,  as  indeed  they  may 
be  allowed  to  do. 

"But  this  demonic  element  appears  most  fruitful 
when  it  shows  itself  as  the  determining  characteristic  in 
an  individual.  In  the  course  of  my  life  I  have  been 
able  to  observe  several  such,  some  near,  some  farther 
off.  They  are  not  always  superior  persons,  either  in 
mind  or  in  talent.  They  seldom  recommend  themselves 
through  goodness  of  heart.  But  a  monstrous  force  goes 
out  from  them,  and  they  exert  an  incredible  power  over 
all  creatures,  and  even  over  the  elements ;  who  shall  say 
how  far  such  an  influence  may  extend  ?  All  united 
moral  powers  avail  nothing  against  them.  In  vain  do 
the  clear-headed  part  of  mankind  discredit  them  as  de- 
ceivers or  deceived,  —  the  mass  is  attracted.  Seldom 
or  never  do  they  meet  their  match  among  their  contem- 
poraries ;  they  are  not  to  be  conquered  save  by  the  uni- 
verse itself,  against  which  they  have  taken  up  arc.  s. 
Out  of  such  experiences  doubtless  arose  the  strange, 
monstrous  proverb,  'Nobody  against  God  but  God.'  " 1 
1  Goethe,  Wdhrheit  und  Dichtung,  Book  xx. 


24  DEMONOLOGY. 

It  would  be  easy  in  the  political  history  of  every 
time  to  furnish  examples  of  this  irregular  success, 
men  having  a  force  which  without  virtue,  without 
shining  talent,  yet  makes  them  prevailing.  No 
equal  appears  in  the  field  against  them.  A  power 
goes  out  from  them  which  draws  all  men  and  events 
to  favor  them.  The  crimes  they  commit,  the  ex= 
posures  which  follow,  and  which  would  ruin  any 
other  man,  are  strangely  overlooked,  or  do  more 
strangely  turn  to  their  account. 

I  set  down  these  things  as  I  find  them,  but  how- 
ever poetic  these  twilights  of  thought,  I  like  day- 
light, and  I  find  somewhat  wilful,  some  play  at 
blindman's-buff,  when  men  as  wise  as  Goethe  talk 
mysteriously  of  the  demonological.  The  insinua- 
tion is  that  the  known  eternal  laws  of  morals  and 
matter  are  sometimes  corrupted  or  evaded  by  this 
gipsy,  principle,  which  chooses  favorites  and  works 
in  the  dark  for  their  behoof  ;  as  if  the  laws  of  the 
Father  of  the  universe  were  sometimes  balked  and 
eluded  by  a  meddlesome  Aunt  of  the  universe  for 
her  pets.  You  will  observe  that  this  extends  the 
popular  idea  of  success  to  the  very  gods  ;  that  they 
foster  a  success  to  you  which  is  not  a  success  to  all ; 
that  fortunate  men,  fortunate  youths  exist,  whose 
good  is  not  virtue  or  the  public  good,  but  a  private 
good,  robbed  from  the  rest.  It  is  a  midsummer- 
madness,  corrupting  all  who  hold  the  tenet.     The 


DEMONOLOGY.  25 

demonologic  is  only  a  fine  name  for  egotism;  an 
exaggeration  namely  of  the  individual,  whom  it  is 
Nature's  settled  purpose  to  postpone.  "  There  is 
one  world  common  to  all  who  are  awake,  but 
each  sleeper  betakes  himself  to  one  of  his  own."  1 
Dreams  retain  the  infirmities  of  our  character. 
The  good  genius  may  be  there  or  not,  our  evil 
genius  is  sure  to  stay.  The  Ego  partial  makes 
the  dream  ;  the  Ego  total  the  interpretation.  Life 
is  also  a  dream  on  the  same  terms. 

The  history  of  man  is  a  series  of  conspiracies  to 
win  from  Nature  some  advantage  without  paying 
for  it.  It  is  curious  to  see  what  grand  powers  we 
have  a  hint  of  and  are  mad  to  grasp,  yet  how  slow 
Heaven  is  to  trust  us  with  such  edge-tools.  "  All 
that  frees  talent  without  increasing  self-command 
is  noxious."  Thus  the  fabled  ring  of  Gyges,  mak- 
ing the  wearer  invisible,  which  is  represented  in 
modern  fable  by  the  telescope  as  used  by  Schlemil, 
is  simply  mischievous.  A  new  or  private  language, 
used  to  serve  only  low  or  political  purposes  ;  the 
transfusion  of  the  blood  ;  the  steam  battery,  so  f a= 
tal  as  to  put  an  end  to  war  by  the  threat  of  univer- 
sal murder ;  the  desired  discovery  of  the  guided  bal- 
loon, are  of  this  kind.  Tramps  are  troublesome 
enough  in  the  city  and  in  the  highways,  but  tramps 
flying  through  the  air  and  descending  on  the  lonely 
1  Heraclitus, 


26  DEMONOLOGY. 

traveller  or  the  lonely  farmer's  house  or  the  bank- 
messenger  in  the  country,  can  well  be  spared.  Men 
are  not  fit  to  be  trusted  with  these  talismans. 

Before  we  acquire  great  power  we  must  acquire 
wisdom  to  use  it  well.  Animal  magnetism  inspires 
the  prudent  and  moral  with  a  certain  terror;  so 
the  divination  of  contingent  events,  and  the  alleged 
second-sight  of  the  pseudo-spiritualists.  There  are 
many  things  of  which  a  wise  man  might  wish  to 
be  ignorant,  and  these  are  such.  Shun  them  as 
you  would  the  secrets  of  the  undertaker  and  the 
butcher.  The  best  are  never  demoniacal  or  mag- 
netic ;  leave  this  limbo  to  the  Prince  of  the  power 
of  the  air.  The  lowest  angel  is  better.  It  is  the 
height  of  the  animal ;  below  the  region  of  the  di- 
vine.    Power  as  such  is  not  known  to  the  angels. 

Great  men  feel  that  they  are  so  by  sacrificing 
their  selfishness  and  falling  back  on  what  is  hu- 
mane ;  in  renouncing  family,  clan,  country,  and 
each  exclusive  and  local  connection,  to  beat  with 
the  pulse  and  breathe  with  the  lungs  of  nations. 
A  Highland  chief,  an  Indian  sachem  or  a  feudal 
baron  may  fancy  that  the  mountains  and  lakes  were 
made  specially  for  him  Donald,  or  him  Tecumseh  ; 
that  the  one  question  for  history  is  the  pedigree  of 
his  house,  and  future  ages  will  be  busy  with  his 
renown  ;  that  he  has  a  guardian  angel ;  that  he  is 
not  in  the  roll  of  common  men,  but  obeys  a  high 


DEMONOLOGY.  27 

family  destiny ;  when  he  acts,  unheard-of  success 
evinces  the  presence  of  rare  agents  ;  what  is  to  be- 
fall him,  omens  and  coincidences  foreshow ;  when 
he  dies  banshees  will  announce  his  fate  to  kinsmen 
in  foreign  parts.  What  more  facile  than  to  project 
this  exuberant  selfhood  into  the  region  where  indi- 
viduality is  forever  bounded  by  generic  and  cosmi- 
cal  laws  ?  The  deepest  flattery,  and  that  to  which 
we  can  never  be  insensible,  is  the  flattery  of  omens. 
We  may  make  great  eyes  if  we  like,  and  say  of 
one  on  whom  the  sun  shines,  "  What  luck  presides 
over  him !  "  But  we  know  that  the  law  of  the 
Universe  is  one  for  each  and  for  all.  There  is  as 
precise  and  as  describable  a  reason  for  every  fact 
occurring  to  him,  as  for  any  occurring  to  any  man. 
Every  fact  in  which  the  moral  elements  intermingle 
is  not  the  less  under  the  dominion  of  fatal  law. 
Lord  Bacon  uncovers  the  magic  when  he  saj^s, 
"  Manifest  virtues  procure  reputation  ;  occult  ones, 
fortune."  Thus  the  so-called  fortunate  man  is  one 
who,  though  not  gifted  to  speak  when  the  people 
listen,  or  to  act  with  grace  or  with  understanding 
to  great  ends,  yet  is  one  who,  in  actions  of  a  low 
or  common  pitch,  relies  on  his  instincts,  and  simply 
does  not  act  where  he  should  not,  but  waits  his 
time,  and  without  effort  acts  when  the  need  is.  If 
to  this  you  add  a  fitness  to  the  society  around  him, 
you  have  the  elements  of  fortune ;  so  that  in  a  par- 


28  DEMONOLOGY. 

ticular  circle  and  knot  of  affairs  he  is  not  so  much 
his  own  man  as  the  hand  of  nature  and  time.  Just 
as  his  eye  and  hand  work  exactly  together,  —  and 
to  hit  the  mark  with  a  stone  he  has  only  to  fasten 
his  eye  firmly  on  the  mark  and  his  arm  will  swing 
true,  —  so  the  main  ambition  and  genius  being  be- 
stowed in  one  direction,  the  lesser  spirits  and  in= 
voluntary  aids  within  his  sphere  will  follow.  The 
fault  of  most  men  is  that  they  are  busybodies ;  do 
not  wait  the  simple  movement  of  the  soul,  but  in- 
terfere and  thwart  the  instructions  of  their  own 
minds. 

Coincidences,  dreams,  animal  magnetism,  omens, 
sacred  lots,  have  great  interest  for  some  minds. 
They  run  into  this  twilight  and  say,  "  There  7s 
more  than  is  dreamed  of  in  your  philosophy." 
Certainly  these  facts  are  interesting,  and  deserve 
to  be  considered.  But  they  are  entitled  only  to 
a  share  of  attention,  and  not  a  large  share. 
Nil  magnificum,  nil  generosum  sapit.  Let  their 
value  as  exclusive  subjects  of  attention  be  judged 
of  by  the  infallible  test  of  the  state  of  mind  in 
which  much  notice  of  them  leaves  us.  Read  a 
page  of  Cudworth  or  of  Bacon,  and  we  are  exhila- 
rated and  armed  to  manly  duties.  Read  denionol- 
ogy  or  Colquhoun's  Report,  and  we  are  bewildered 
and  perhaps  a  little  besmirched.  We  grope. 
They  who  love  them  say  they  are  to  reveal  to  us  a 


DEMONOLOGY.  29 

world  of  unknown,  unsuspected  truths.  But  sup- 
pose a  diligent  collection  and  study  of  these  occult 
facts  were  made,  they  are  merely  physiological,  semi- 
medical,  related  to  the  machinery  of  man,  open- 
ing to  our  curiosity  how  we  live,  and  no  aid  on  the 
superior  problems  why  we  live,  and  what  we  do. 
While  the  dilettanti  have  been  prying  into  the 
humors  and  muscles- of  the  eye,  simple  men  will 
have  helped  themselves  and  the  world  by  using 
their  eyes. 

And  this  is  not  the  least  remarkable  fact  which 
the  adepts  have  developed.  Men  who  had  never 
wondered  at  anything,  who  had  thought  it  the  most 
natural  thing  in  the  world  that  they  should  exist 
in  this  orderly  and  replenished  world,  have  been 
unable  to  suppress  their  amazement  at  the  dis- 
closures of  the  somnambulist.  The  peculiarity  of 
the  history  of  Animal  Magnetism  is  that  it  drew 
in  as  inquirers  and  students  a  class  of  persons 
never  on  any  other  occasion  known  as  students 
and  inquirers.  Of  course  the  inquiry  is  pursued 
on  low  principles.  Animal  magnetism  peeps.  It 
becomes  in  such  hands  a  black  art.  The  uses  of 
the  thing,  the  commodity,  the  power,  at  once  come 
to  mind  and  direct  the  course  of  inquiry.  It 
seemed  to  open  again  that  door  which  was  open 
to  the  imagination  of  childhood  —  of  magicians 
and  fairies  and  lamps  of  Aladdin,  the   travelling 


30  DEMONOLOGY. 

cloak,  the  shoes  of  swiftness  and  the  sword  of 
sharpness  that  were  to  satisfy  the  uttermost  wish 
of  the  senses  without  danger  or  a  drop  of  sweat. 
But  as  Nature  can  never  be  outwitted,  as  in  the 
Universe  no  man  was  ever  known  to  get  a  cent's 
worth  without  paying  in  some  form  or  other  the 
cent,  so  this  prodigious  promiser  ends  always  and 
always  will,  as  sorcery  and  alchemy  have  done  be- 
fore, in  very  small  and  smoky  performance. 

Mesmerism  is  high  life  below  stairs;  Momus 
playing  Jove  in  the  kitchens  of  Olympus.  'Tis 
a  low  curiosity  or  lust  of  structure,  and  is  sepa- 
rated by  celestial  diameters  from  the  love  of  spir- 
itual truths.  It  is  wholly  a  false  view  to  couple 
these  things  in  any  manner  with  the  religious  na- 
ture and  sentiment,  and  a  most  dangerous  super- 
stition to  raise  them  to  the  lofty  place  of  motives 
and  sanctions.  This  is  to  prefer  halos  and  rain- 
bows to  the  sun  and  moon.  These  adepts  have 
mistaken  flatulency  for  inspiration.  Were  this 
drivel  which  they  report  as  the  voice  of  spirits 
really  such,  we  must  find  out  a  more  decisive  sui- 
cide.    I  say  to  the  table-rappers :  — 

"  I  well  believe 
Thou  wilt  not  utter  what  thou  dost  not  know, 
And  so  far  will  T  trust  thee,  gentle  Kate." 

They  are  ignorant  of  all  that  is  healthy  and 
useful  to   know,  and   by  laws   of  kind,  —  dunces 


DEMONOLOGY.  31 

seeking  dunces  in  the  dark  of  what  they  call  the 
spiritual  world,  —  preferring  snores  and  gastric 
noises  to  the  voice  of  any  muse.  I  think  the 
rappings  a  new  test,  like  blue  litmus  or  other 
chemical  absorbent,  to  try  catechisms  with.  It 
detects  organic  skepticism  in  the  very  heads  of  the 
Church.  'Tis  a  lawless  world.  We  have  left  the 
geometry,  the  compensation,  and  the  conscience  of 
the  daily  world,  and  come  into  the  realm  or  chaos 
of  chance  and  pretty  or  ugly  confusion ;  no  guilt 
and  no  virtue,  but  a  droll  bedlam,  where  every- 
body believes  only  after  his  humor,  and  the  ac- 
tors and  spectators  have  no  conscience  or  reflection, 
no  police,  no  foot-rule,  no  sanity,  —  nothing  but 
whim  and  whim  creative. 

Meantime  far  be  from  me  the  impatience  which 
cannot  brook  the  supernatural,  the  vast;  far  be 
from  me  the  lust  of  explaining  away  all  which 
appeals  to  the  imagination,  and  the  great  presenti- 
ments which  haunt  us.  Willingly  I  too  say,  Hail ! 
to  the  unknown  awful  powers  which  transcend 
the  ken  of  the  understanding.  And  the  attrac- 
tion which  this  topic  has  had  for  me  and  which  in- 
duces me  to  unfold  its  parts  before  you  is  precisely 
because  1  think  the  numberless  forms  in  which  this 
superstition  has  re-appeared  in  every  time  and 
every  people  indicates  the  inextinguishableness  of 
wonder  in  man  ;  betrays  his  conviction  that  behind 


32  DEMONOLOGY. 

all  your  explanations  is  a  vast  and  potent  and  liv- 
ing Nature,  inexhaustible  and  sublime,  which  you 
cannot  explain.  He  is  sure  no  book,  no  man  has 
told  him  all.  He  is  sure  the  great  Instinct,  the 
circumambient  soul  which  flows  into  him  as  into 
all,  and  is  his  life,  has  not  been  searched.  He 
is  sure  that  intimate  relations  subsist  between  his 
character  and  his  fortunes,  between  him  and  his 
world ;  and  until  he  can  adequately  tell  them  he 
will  tell  them  wildly  and  fabulously.  Demonology 
is  the  shadow  of  Theology. 

The  whole  world  is  an  omen  and  a  sign.  Why 
look  so  wistfully  in  a  corner  ?  Man  is  the  Image 
of  God.  Why  run  after  a  ghost  or  a  dream  ? 
The  voice  of  divination  resounds  everywhere  and 
runs  to  waste  unheard,  unregarded,  as  the  moun- 
tains echo  with  the  bleatings  of  cattle. 


ARISTOCRACY. 


But  if  thou  do  thy  best, 

"Without  remission,  without  rest, 

And  invite  the  sunbeam, 

And  abhor  to  feign  or  seem 

Even  to  those  who  thee  should  love 

And  thy  behavior  approve  ; 

If  thou  go  in  thine  own  likeness,  — 

Be  it  health  or  be  it  sickness,  — 

If  thou  go  as  thy  father's  son, 

If  thou  wear  no  mask  or  lie, 

Dealing  purely  and  nakedly,  —  0  o  « 


ARISTOCKACY. 


Theee  is  an  attractive  topic,  which  never  goes 
out  of  vogue  and  is  impertinent  in  no  community, 
—  the  permanent  traits  of  the  Aristocracy.  It  is 
an  interest  of  the  human  race,  and,  as  I  look  at  it, 
inevitable,  sacred  and  to  be  found  in  every  country 
and  in  every  company  of  men.  My  concern  with 
it  is  that  concern  which  all  well  -  disposed  persons 
will  feel,  that  there  should  be  model  men,  —  true 
instead  of  spurious  pictures  of  excellence,  and,  if 
possible,  living  standards. 

I  observe  that  the  word  gentleman  is  gladly 
heard  in  all  companies ;  that  the  cogent  motive  with 
the  best  young  men  who  are  revolving  plans  and 
forming  resolutions  for  the  future,  is  the  spirit  of 
honor,  the  wish  to  be  gentlemen.  They  do  not 
yet  covet  political  power,  nor  any  exuberance  of 
wealth,  wealth  that  costs  too  much ;  nor  do  they 
wish  to  be  saints ;  for  fear  of  partialism  ;  but  the  r 

middle  term,  the  reconciling  element,  the  success  of        ,y 

1  First  read   as  a  lecture  —  in  England  —  in  1848  ;  here  1, 

printed  with  additions  from  other  papers.  j 


36  ARISTOCRACY. 

the  manly  character,  they  find  in  the  idea  of  gentle- 
man. It  is  not  to  be  a  man  of  rank,  but  a  man  of 
honor,  accomplished  in  all  arts  and  generosities, 
which  seems  to  them  the  right  mark  and  the  true 
chief  of  our  modern  society.  A  reference  to  society 
is  part  of  the  idea  of  culture ;  science  of  a  gentle- 
man ;  art  of  a  gentleman  ;  poetry  in  a  gentleman  s 
intellectually  held,  that  is,  for  their  own  sake,  for 
what  they  are;  for  their  universal  beauty  and 
worth;  — not  for  economy,  which  degrades  them, 
but  not  over-intellectually,  that  is,  not  to  ecstasy,  en- 
trancing the  man,  but  redounding  to  his  beauty 
and  glory. 

In  the  sketches  which  I  have  to  offer  I  shall  not 
be  surprised  if  my  readers  should  fancy  that  I  am 
giving  them,  under  a  gayer  title,  a  chapter  on  Edu- 
cation. It  will  not  pain  me  if  I  am  found  now  and 
then  to  rove  from  the  accepted  and  historic,  to  a 
theoretic  peerage  :  or  if  it  should  turn  out,  what  is 
true,  that  I  am  describing  a  real  aristocracy,  a  chap- 
ter of  Templars  who  sit  indifferently  in  all  climates 
and  under  the  shadow  of  all  institutions,  but  so 
few,  so  heedless  of  badges,  so  rarely  convened,  so 
little  in  sympathy  with  the  predominant  politics  of 
nations,  that  their  names  and  doings  are  not  re- 
corded hi  any  Book  of  Peerage,  or  any  Court  Jour- 
nal, or  even  Daily  Newspaper  of  the  world. 

I  find  the  caste  in  the  man.     The  Golden  Book 


ARISTOCRACY.  37 

of  Venice,  the  scale  of  European  chivalry,  the 
Barons  of  England,  the  hierarchy  of  India  with  its 
impassable  degrees,  is  each  a  transcript  of  the  deci- 
grade  or  centigraded  Man.  A  many-chambered 
Aristocracy  lies  already  organized  in  his  moods  and 
faculties.  Room  is  found  for  all  the  departments 
of  the  State  in  the  moods  and  faculties  of  each  hu- 
man spirit,  with  separate  function  and  difference  of 
dignity. 

The  terrible  aristocracy  that  is  in  nature.  Real 
people  dwelling  with  the  real,  face  to  face  un- 
daunted :  then,  far  down,  people  of  taste,  people 
dwelling  in  a  relation,  or  rumor,  or  influence  of 
good  and  fair,  entertained  by  it,  superficially 
touched,  yet  charmed  by  these  shadows  :  —  and, 
far  below  these,  gross  and  thoughtless,  the  animal 
man,  billows  of  chaos,  down  to  the  dancing  and 
menial  organizations, 

I  observe  the  inextinguishable  prejudice  men 
have  in  favor  of  a  hereditary  transmission  of  quali- 
ties. It  is  in  vain  to  remind  them  that  Nature  ap- 
pears capricious.  Some  qualities  she  carefully  fixes 
and  transmits,  but  some,  and  those  the  finer,  she 
exhales  with  the  breath  of  the  individual,  as  too 
costly  to  perpetuate.  But  I  notice  also  that  they 
may  become  fixed  and  permanent  in  any  stock,  by 
painting  and  repainting  them  on  every  individual, 
until  at  last  Nature  adopts  them  and  bakes  them 
into  her  porcelain. 


38  ARISTOCRACY. 

At  all  events  I  take  this  inextinguishable  persua- 
sion in  men's  minds  as  a  hint  from  the  outward 
universe  to  man  to  inlay  as  many  virtues  and  supe- 
riorities as  he  can  into  this  swift  fresco  of  the  day9 
which  is  hardening  to  an  immortal  picture. 

If  one  thinks  of  the  interest  which  all  men  have  in 
beauty  of  character  and  manners ;  that  it  is  of  the 
last  importance  to  the  imagination  and  affection, 
inspiring  as  it  does  that  loyalty  and  worship  so  es- 
sential to  the  finish  of  character, —  certainly,  if  cul- 
ture, if  laws,  if  primogeniture,  if  heraldry,  if  money 
could  secure  such  a  result  as  superior  and  finished 
men,  it  would  be  the  interest  of  all  mankind  to  see 
that  the  steps  were  taken,  the  pains  incurred.  No 
taxation,  no  concession,  no  conferring  of  privileges 
never  so  exalted  would  be  a  price  too  large. 

The  old  French  Revolution  attracted  to  its  first 
movement  all  the  liberality,  virtue,  hope  and  poetry 
in  Europe.  By  the  abolition  of  kingship  and  aris- 
tocracy, tyranny,  inequality  and  poverty  would  end. 
Alas !  no  ;  tyranny,  inequality,  poverty,  stood  as  fast 
and  fierce  as  ever.  We  likewise  put  faith  in  Democ- 
racy ;  in  the  Republican  principle  carried  out  to  the 
extremes  of  practice  in  universal  suffrage,  in  the  will 
of  majorities.  The  young  adventurer  finds  that  the 
relations  of  society,  the  position  of  classes,  irk  and 
sting  him,  and  he  lends  himself  to  each  malignant 
party  that  assails  what  is  eminent.     He  will  one 


ARISTOCRACY.  39 

day  know  that  this  is  not  removable,  but  a  distinc- 
tion in  the  nature  of  things ;  that  neither  the  caucus, 
nor  the  newspaper,  nor  the  Congress,  nor  the  mob, 
nor  the  guillotine,  nor  fire,  nor  all  together,  can  avail 
to  outlaw,  cut  out,  burn,  or  destroy  the  offense  of  su- 
])eriority  in  persons.  The  manners,  the  pretension, 
which  annoy  me  so  much,  are  not  superficial,  but 
built  on  a  real  distinction  in  the  nature  of  my  com- 
panion. The  superiority  in  him  is  inferiority  in 
me,  and  if  this  particular  companion  were  wiped 
by  a  sponge  out  of  nature,  my  inferiority  would  still 
be  made  evident  to  me  by  other  persons  everywhere 
and  every  day. 

No,  not  the  hardest  utilitarian  will  question  the 
value  of  an  aristocracy  if  he  love  himself.  For 
every  man  confesses  that  the  highest  good  which 
the  universe  proposes  to  him  is  the  highest  society. 
If  a  few  grand  natures  should  come  to  us  and  weave 
duties  and  offices  between  us  and  them,  it  would 
make  our  bread  ambrosial. 

I  affirm  that  inequalities  exist,  not  in  costume, 
but  in  the  powers  of  expression  and  action ;  a  prim- 
itive aristocracy ;  and  that  we,  certainly,  have  not 
come  here  to  describe  well-dressed  vulgarity.  I 
cannot  tell  how  English  titles  are  bestowed,  whether 
on  pure  blood,  or  on  the  largest  holder  in  the  three- 
per-cents.  The  English  government  and  people,  01 
the  French  government,  may  easily  make  mistakes  j 


40  ARISTOCRACY. 

but  Nature  makes  none.  Every  mark  and  scutch- 
eon of  hers  indicates  constitutional  qualities.  In 
science,  in  trade,  in  social  discourse,  as  in  the  state, 
it  is  the  same  thing.  Forever  and  ever  it  takes  a 
pound  to  lift  a  pound. 

It  is  plain  that  all  the  deference  of  modern  soci= 
ety  to  this  idea  of  the  Gentleman,  and  all  the  whim- 
sical tyranny  of  Fashion  which  has  continued  to  en- 
graft itself  on  this  reverence,  is  a  secret  homage  to 
reality  and  love  which  ought  to  reside  in  every  man. 
This  is  the  steel  that  is  hid  under  gauze  and  lace, 
under  flowers  and  spangles.  And  it  is  plain  that 
instead  of  this  idolatry,  a  worship ;  instead  of  this 
impure,  a  pure  reverence  for  character,  a  new  re- 
spect for  the  sacredness  of  the  individual  man,  is 
that  antidote  which  must  correct  in  our  country  the 
disgraceful  deference  to  public  opinion,  and  the  in- 
sane subordination  of  the  end  to  the  means.  From 
the  folly  of  too  much  association  we  must  come  back 
to  the  repose  of  self -reverence  and  trust. 

The  game  of  the  world  is  a  perpetual  trial  of 
strength  between  man  and  events.  The  common 
man  is  the  victim  of  events.  Whatever  happens  is 
too  much  for  him,  he  is  drawn  this  way  and  that 
way,  and  his  whole  life  is  a  hurry.  The  superior 
man  is  at  home  in  his  own  mind.  We  like  cool 
people,  who  neither  hope  nor  fear  too  much,  but 
seem  to  have  many  strings  to  their  bow,  and  can 


ARISTOCRACY.  41 

survive  the  blow  well  enough  if  stock  should  rise 
or  fall,  if  parties  should  be  broken  up,  if  their  money 
or  their  family  should  be  dispersed  ;  who  can  stand 
a  slander  very  well ;  indeed  on  whom  events  make 
little  or  no  impression,  and  who  can  face  death  with 
firmness.  In  short,  we  dislike  every  mark  of  a  su- 
perficial life  and  action,  and  prize  whatever  mark 
of  a  central  life. 

What  is  the  meaning  of  this  invincible  respect 
for  war,  here  in  the  triumphs  of  our  commercial 
civilization,  that  we  can  never  quite  smother  the 
trumpet  and  the  drum  ?  How  is  it  that  the  sword 
runs  away  with  all  the  fame  from  the  spade  and  the 
wheel  ?  How  sturdy  seem  to  us  in  the  history,  those 
Merovingians,  Guelphs,  Dorias,  Sforzas,  Burgun- 
dies and  Gnesclins  of  the  old  warlike  ages !  We 
can  hardly  believe  they  were  all  such  speedy  shad- 
ows as  we ;  that  an  ague  or  fever,  a  drop  of  water 
or  a  crystal  of  ice  ended  them.  We  give  soldiers 
the  same  advantage  to-day.  From  the  most  accu- 
mulated culture  we  are  always  running  back  to  the 
sound  of  any  drum  and  fife.  And  in  any  trade,  or 
in  law-courts,  in  orchard  and  farm,  and  even  in  sa- 
loons, they  only  prosper  or  they  prosper  best  who 
have  a  military  mind,  who  engineer  in  sword  and 
cannon  style,  with  energy  and  sharpness.  Why, 
but  because  courage  never  loses  its  high  price? 
Why,  but  because  we  wish  to  see  those  to  whom  ex> 


42  ARISTOCRACY. 

istence  is  most  adorned  and  attractive,  foremost  to 
peril  it  for  their  object,  and  ready  to  answer  for 
their  actions  with  their  life. 

The  existence  of  an  upper  class  is  not  injurious, 
as  long  as  it  is  dependent  on  merit.  For  so  long  it 
is  provocation  to  the  bold  and  generous.  These 
distinctions  exist,  and  they  are  deep,  not  to  be 
talked  or  voted  away.  If  the  differences  are  or- 
ganic, so  are  the  merits,  that  is  to  say  the  power 
and  excellence  we  describe  are  real.  Aristocracy 
is  the  class  eminent  by  personal  qualities,  and  to 
them  belongs  without  assertion  a  proper  influence. 
Men  of  aim  must  lead  the  aimless ;  men  of  inven- 
tion the  uninventive.  I  wish  catholic  men,  who  by 
their  science  and  skill  are  at  home  in  every  latitude 
and  longitude,  who  carry  the  world  in  their 
thoughts ;  men  of  universal  politics,  who  are  inter- 
ested in  things  in  proportion  to  their  truth  and  mag- 
nitude ;  who  know  the  beauty  of  animals  and  the 
laws  of  their  nature,  whom  the  mystery  of  botany 
allures,  and  the  mineral  laws ;  who  see  general  ef- 
fects and  are  not  too  learned  to  love  the  Imagi- 
nation, the  power  and  the  spirits  of  Solitude ;  — 
men  who  see  the  dance  in  men's  lives  as  well  as  in 
a  ball-room,  and  can  feel  and  convey  the  sense 
which  is  only  collectively  or  totally  expressed  by  a 
population ;  men  who  are  charmed  by  the  beauti- 
ful Nemesis  as  well  as  by  the  dire  Nemesis,  and 


ARISTOCRACY.  43 

dare  trust  their  inspiration  for  their  welcome ;  who 
would  find  their  fellows  in  persons  of  real  elevation 
of  whatever  kind  of  speculative  or  practical  ability. 
We  are  fallen  on  times  so  acquiescent  and  tradi- 
tionary that  we  are  in  danger  of  forgetting  so  sim- 
ple a  fact  as  that  the  basis  of  all  aristocracy  must 
be  truth,  —  the  doing  what  elsewhere  is  pretended 
to  be  done.  One  would  gladly  see  all  our  institu- 
tions rightly  aristocratic  in  this  wise. 

I  enumerate  the  claims  by  which  men  enter  the 
superior  class. 

1.  A  commanding  talent.  In  every  company 
one  finds  the  best  man  ;  and  if  there  be  any  ques- 
tion, it  is  decided  the  instant  they  enter  into  any 
practical  enterprise.  If  the  finders  of  glass,  gun= 
powder,  printing,  electricity,  —  if  the  healer  of 
small-pox,  the  contriver  of  the  safety  lamp,  of  the 
aqueduct,  of  the  bridge,  of  the  tunnel ;  if  the  find- 
ers of  parallax,  of  new  planets,  of  steam  power  for 
boat  and  carriage,  the  finder  of  sulphuric  ether  and 
the  electric  telegraph,  —  if  these  men  should  keep 
their  secrets,  or  only  communicate  them  to  each 
other,  must  not  the  whole  race  of  mankind  serve 
them  as  gods  ?  It  only  needs  to  look  at  the  social 
aspect  of  England  and  America  and  France,  to 
see  the  rank  which  original  practical  talent  com- 
mands. 

Every  survey  of  the  dignified  classes,  in  ancient 


44  ARISTOCRACY 

or  modern  history,  imprints  universal  lessons,  and 
establishes  a  nobility  of  a  prouder  creation.  And 
the  conclusion  which  Roman  Senators,  Indian  Brah- 
mins, Persian  Magians,  European  Nobles  and  great 
Americans  inculcate,  —  that  which  they  preach  out 
of  their  material  wealth  and  glitter,  out  of  their 
old  war  and  modern  land-owning,  even  out  of  sen- 
suality and  sneers,  is,  that  the  radical  and  essential 
distinctions  of  every  aristocracy  are  moral.  Do 
not  hearken  to  the  men,  but  to  the  Destiny  in  the 
institutions.  An  aristocracy  is  composed  of  simple 
and  sincere  men  for  whom  nature  and  ethics  are 
strong  enough,  who  say  what  they  mean  and  go 
straight  to  their  objects.     It  is  essentially  real. 

The  multiplication  of  monarchs  known  by  tele- 
graph and  daily  news  from  all  countries  to  the 
daily  papers,  and  the  effect  of  freer  institutions  in 
England  and  America,  has  robbed  the  title  of  king 
of  all  its  romance,  as  that  of  our  commercial  con- 
suls as  compared  with  the  ancient  Roman.  We 
shall  come  to  add  "  Kings  "  in  the  "  Contents"  of 
the  Directory,  as  we  do  "  Physicians,"  "  Brokers," 
etc.  In  simple  communities,  in  the  heroic  ages,  a 
man  was  chosen  for  his  knack ;  got  his  name,  rank 
and  living  for  that ;  and  the  best  of  the  best  was 
the  aristocrat  or  king.  In  the  Norse  Edda  it  ap- 
pears as  the  curious  but  excellent  policy  of  con- 
tending tribes,  when  tired  of  war,  to  exchange  host- 


ARISTOCRACY.  45 

ages,  and  in  reality  each  to  adopt  from  the  other  a 
first-rate  man,  who  thus  acquired  a  new  country ; 
was  at  once  made  a  chief.  And  no  wrong  was  so 
keenly  resented  as  any  fraud  in  this  transaction 
In  the  heroic  ages,  as  we  call  them,  the  hero  uni- 
formly has  some  real  talent.  Ulysses  in  Homer  is 
represented  as  a  very  skilful  carpenter.  He  builds 
the  boat  with  which  he  leaves  Calypso's  isle,  and  in 
his  own  palace  carves  a  bedstead  out  of  the  trunk 
of  a  tree  and  inlays  it  with  gold  and  ivory.  Epeus 
builds  the  wooden  horse.  The  English  nation  down 
to  a  late  age  inherited  the  reality  of  the  Northern 
stock.  In  1373,  in  writs  of  summons  of  members 
of  Parliament,  the  sheriff  of  every  county  is  to 
cause  "two  dubbed  knights,  or  the  most  worthy 
esquires,  the  most  expert  in  feats  of  arms,  and  no 
others ;  and  of  every  city,  two  citizens,  and  of  every 
borough,  two  burgesses,  such  as  have  greatest  skill 
in  shipping  and  merchandising,  to  be  returned." 

The  ancients  were  fond  of  ascribing  to  their  no- 
bles gigantic  proportions  and  strength.  The  hero 
must  have  the  force  of  ten  men.  The  chief  is 
taller  by  a  head  than  any  of  his  tribe.  Douglas 
can  throw  the  bar  a  greater  cast.  Richard  can 
sever  the  iron  bolt  with  his  sword.  The  horn  of 
Roland,  in  the  romance,  is  heard  sixty  miles.  The 
Cid  has  a  prevailing  health  that  will  let  him  nurse 
the  leper,  and  share  his  bed  without  harm.     And 


46  ARISTOCRACY. 

since  the  body  is  the  pipe  through  which  we  tap 
all  the  succors  and  virtues  of  the  material  world,  it 
is  certain  that  a  sound  body  must  be  at  the  root  of 
any  excellence  in  manners  and  actions  ;  a  strong 
and  supple  frame  which  yields  a  stock  of  strength 
and  spirits  for  all  the  needs  of  the  day,  and  gener- 
ates the  habit  of  relying  on  a  supply  of  power  for 
all  extraordinary  exertions.  When  Nature  goes  to 
create  a  national  man,  she  puts  a  symmetry  between 
the  physical  and  intellectual  powers.  She  moulds 
a  large  brain,  and  joins  to  it  a  great  trunk  to  sup- 
ply it ;  as  if  a  fine  alembic  were  fed  with  liquor 
for  its  distillations  from  broad  full  vats  in  the 
vaults  of  the  laboratory. 

Certainly,  the  origin  of  most  of  the  perversities 
and  absurdities  that  disgust  us  is,  primarily,  the 
want  of  health.  Genius  is  health  and  Beauty  is 
health  and  Virtue  is  health.  The  petty  arts  which 
we  blame  in  the  half-great  seem  as  odious  to  them 
also ;  —  the  resources  of  weakness  and  despair. 
And  the  manners  betray  the  like  puny  constitu- 
tion. Temperament  is  fortune,  and  we  must  say  it 
so  often.  In  a  thousand  cups  of  life,  only  one  is 
the  right  mixture,  —  a  fine  adjustment  to  the  exist- 
ing elements.  When  that  befalls,  when  the  well- 
mixed  man  is  born,  with  eyes  not  too  dull  nor  too 
good,  with  fire  enough  and  earth  enough,  capable 
of  impressions  from  all  things,  and  not  too  suscep 


ARISTOCRACY.  47 

tible,  —  then  no  gift  need  be  bestowed  on  him,  he 
brings  with  him  fortune,  followers,  love,  power. 
"  I  think  he'll  be  to  Rome 
As  is  the  osprey  to  the  fish,  who  takes  it 
By  sovereignty  of  nature." 

Not  the  phrenologist  but  the  philosopher  may 
well  say,  Let  me  see  his  brain,  and  I  will  tell  you 
if  he  shall  be  poet,  king,  founder  of  cities,  rich, 
magnetic,  of  a  secure  hand,  of  a  scientific  memory, 
a  right  classifier ;  or  whether  he  shall  be  a  bun- 
gler, driveller,  unlucky,  heavy,  and  tedious. 

It  were  to  dispute  against  the  sun,  to  deny  this 
difference  of  brain.  I  see  well  enough  that  when 
I  bring  one  man  into  an  estate,  he  sees  vague  capa- 
bilities, what  others  might,  could,  would,  or  should 
do  with  it.  If  I  bring  another  man,  he  sees  what 
he  should  do  with  it.  He  appreciates  the  water- 
privilege,  land  fit  for  orchard,  tillage,  pasturage, 
wood-lot,  cranberry-meadow ;  but  just  as  easily  he 
foresees  all  the  means,  all  the  steps  of  the  process, 
and  could  lay  his  hand  as  readily  on  one  as  on  an- 
other point  in  that  series  which  opens  the  capability 
to  the  last  point.  The  poet  sees  wishfully  enough 
the  result;  the  well-built  head  supplies  all  the 
steps,  one  as  perfect  as  the  other,  in  the  series.  See- 
ing this  working  head  in  him,  it  becomes  to  me  as 
certain  that  he  will  have  the  direction  of  estates,  as 
that  there  are  estates.     If  we  see  tools  in  a  maga- 


48  ARISTOCRACY. 

zine,  as  a  file,  an  anchor,  a  plough,  a  pump,  a  paint- 
brush, a  cider-press,  a  diving-bell,  we  can  predict 
well  enough  their  destination  ;  and  the  man's  as- 
sociations, fortunes,  love,  hatred,  residence,  rank, 
the  books  he  will  buy,  the  roads  he  will  traverse 
are  predetermined  in  his  organism.  Men  will  need 
him,  and  he  is  rich  and  eminent  by  nature.  That 
man  cannot  be  too  late  or  too  early.  Let  him  not 
hurry  or  hesitate.  Though  millions  are  already 
arrived,  his  seat  is  reserved.  Though  millions  at- 
tend, they  only  multiply  his  friends  and  agents. 
It  never  troubles  the  Senator  what  multitudes 
crack  the  benches  and  bend  the  galleries  to  hear. 
He  who  understands  the  art  of  war,  reckons  the  hos- 
tile battalions  and  cities,  opportunities  and  spoils. 

An  aristocracy  could  not  exist  unless  it  were  or- 
ganic. Men  are  born  to  command,  and  —  it  is 
even  so  —  "come  into  the  world  booted  and  spurred 
to  ride."  The  blood  royal  never  pays,  we  say.  It 
obtains  service,  gifts,  supplies,  furtherance  of  all 
kinds  from  the  love  and  joy  of  those  who  feel 
themselves  honored  by  the  service  they  render. 

Dull  people  think  it  Fortune  that  makes  one 
rich  and  another  poor.  Is  it  ?  Yes,  but  the  for- 
tune was  earlier  than  they  think,  namely,  in  the 
balance  or  adjustment  between  devotion  to  what  is 
agreeable  to-day  and  the  forecast  of  what  will  be 
valuable  to-morrow. 


ARISTOCRACY.  49 

Certainly  I  am  not  going  to  argue  the  merits  of 
gradation  in  the  universe ;  the  existing  order  of 
more  or  less.  Neither  do  I  wish  to  go  into  a  vin- 
dication of  the  justice  that  disposes  the  variety  of 
lot.  I  know  how  steep  the  contrast  of  condition 
looks ;  such  excess  here  and  such  destitution  there ; 
like  entire  chance,  like  the  freaks  of  the  wind, 
heaping  the  snow-drift  in  gorges,  stripping  the 
plain ;  such  despotism  of  wealth  and  comfort  in 
banquet-halls,  whilst  death  is  in  the  pots  of  the 
wretched,  —  that  it  behooves  a  good  man  to  walk 
with  tenderness  and  heed  amidst  so  much  suffering. 
I  only  point  in  passing  to  the  order  of  the  universe, 
which  makes  a  rotation,  —  not  like  the  coarse  pol- 
icy of  the  Greeks,  ten  generals,  each  commanding 
one  day  and  then  giving  place  to  the  next,  or  like 
our  democratic  politics,  my  turn  now,  your  turn 
next,  —  but  the  constitution  of  things  has  distrib- 
uted a  new  quality  or  talent  to  each  mind,  and  the 
revolution  of  things  is  always  bringing  the  need, 
now  of  this,  now  of  that,  and  is  sure  to  bring  home 
the  opportunity  to  every  one. 

The  only  relief  that  I  know  against  the  invidi- 
ousness  of  superior  position  is,  that  you  exert  your 
faculty ;  for  whilst  each  does  that,  he  excludes  hard 
thoughts  from  the  spectator.  All  right  activity  is 
amiable.  I  never  feel  that  any  man  occupies  my 
place,  but  that  the  reason  why  I  do  not  have  what 


50  ARISTOCRACY. 

I  wish,  is,  that  I  want  the  faculty  which  entitles. 
All  spiritual  or  real  power  makes  its  own  place. 

We  pass  for  what  we  are,  and  we  prosper  or  fail 
by  what  we  are.  There  are  men  who  may  dare 
much  and  will  be  justified  in  their  daring.  But  it 
is  because  they  know  they  are  in  their  place.  As 
long  as  I  am  in  my  place,  I  am  safe.  "  The  best 
lightning-rod  for  your  protection  is  your  own 
spine."  Let  a  man's  social  aims  be  proportioned 
to  his  means  and  power.  I  do  not  pity  the  misery 
of  a  man  underplaced :  that  will  right  itself  pres- 
ently :  but  I  pity  the  man  overplaced.  A  certain 
quantity  of  power  belongs  to  a  certain  quantity  of 
faculty.  Whoever  wants  more  power  than  is  the 
legitimate  attraction  of  his  faculty,  is  a  politician, 
and  must  pay  for  that  excess  ;  must  truckle  for  it. 
This  is  the  whole  game  of  society  and  the  politics 
of  the  world.  Being  will  always  seem  well ;  — 
but  whether  possibly  I  cannot  contrive  to  seem, 
without  the  trouble  of  being  ?  Every  Frenchman 
would  have  a  career.  We  English  are  not  any 
better  with  our  love  of  making  a  figure.  "  I  told 
the  Duke  of  Newcastle,"  says  Bubb  Doddington  in 
his  Memoirs,  "  that  it  must  end  one  way  or  an- 
other, it  must  not  remain  as  it  was  ;  for  I  was  de- 
termined to  make  some  sort  of  a  figure  in  life ;  I 
earnestly  wished  it  might  be  under  his  protection, 
but  if  that  could  not  be,  I  must  make  some  figure  j 


ARISTOCRACY.  51 

what  it  would  be  I  could  not  determine  yet ;  I 
must  look  round  me  a  little  and  consult  my  friends, 
but  some  figure  I  was  resolved  to  make." 

It  will  be  agreed  everywhere  that  society  must 
have  the  benefit  of  the  best  leaders.  How  to 
obtain  them?  Birth  has  been  tried  and  failed. 
Caste  in  India  has  no  good  result.  Ennobling  of 
one  family  is  good  for  one  generation ;  not  sure  be- 
yond. Slavery  had  mischief  enough  to  answer  for, 
but  it  had  this  good  in  it,  —  the  pricing  of  men. 
In  the  South  a  slave  was  bluntly  but  accurately 
valued  at  five  hundred  to  a  thousand  dollars,  if  a 
good  field-hand ;  if  a  mechanic,  as  carpenter  or 
smith,  twelve  hundred  or  two  thousand.  In  Kome 
or  Greece  what  sums  would  not  be  paid  for  a  supe- 
rior slave,  a  confidential  secretary  and  manager,  an 
educated  slave  ;  a  man  of  genius,  a  Moses  educated 
in  Egypt  ?  I  don't  know  how  much  Epictetus  was 
sold  for,  or  iEsop,  or  Toussaint  l'Ouverture,  and 
perhaps  it  was  not  a  good  market-day.  Time  was, 
in  England,  when  the  state  stipulated  beforehand 
what  price  should  be  paid  for  each  citizen's  life,  if 
he  was  killed.  Now,  if  it  were  possible,  I  should 
like  to  see  that  appraisal  applied  to  every  man,  and 
every  man  made  acquainted  with  the  true  number 
and  weight  of  every  adult  citizen,  and  that  he  be 
placed  where  he  belongs,  with  so  much  power  con- 
fided  to  him  as  he  could  carry  and  use. 


52  ARISTOCRACY. 

In  the  absence  of  such  anthropometer  I  have  a 
perfect  confidence  in  the  natural  laws.  I  think 
that  the  community,  —  every  community,  if  ob- 
structing laws  and  usages  are  removed,  —  will  be 
the  best  measure  and  the  justest  judge  of  the  citi- 
zen, or  will  in  the  long  run  give  the  fairest  verdict 
and  reward ;  better  than  any  royal  patronage ;  bet- 
ter than  any  premium  on  race  ;  better  than  any 
statute  elevating  families  to  hereditary  distinction, 
or  any  class  to  sacerdotal  education  and  power. 
The  verdict  of  battles  will  best  prove  the  general ; 
the  town-meeting,  the  Congress,  will  not  fail  to  find 
out  legislative  talent.  The  prerogatives  of  a  right 
physician  are  determined,  not  by  his  diplomas,  but 
by  the  health  he  restores  to  body  and  mind ;  the 
powers  of  a  geometer  by  solving  his  problem  ;  of  a 
priest  by  the  act  of  inspiring  us  with  a  sentiment 
which  disperses  the  grief  from  which  we  suffered. 
When  the  lawyer  tries  his  case  in  court  he  himself 
is  also  on  trial  and  his  own  merits  appear  as  well 
as  his  client's.  When  old  writers  are  consulted  by 
young  writers  who  have  written  their  first  book, 
they  say,  Publish  it  by  all  means  ;  so  only  can  you 
certainly  know  its  quality. 

But  we  venture  to  put  any  man  in  any  place.  It 
Is  curious  how  negligent  the  public  is  of  the  essen- 
tial qualifications  of  its  representatives.  They  ask 
if  a  man  is  a  republican,  a  democrat  ?     Yes,    Is  he 


ARISTOCRACY.  53 

a  man  of  talent  ?  Yes.  Is  he  honest  and  not  look- 
ing for  an  office  or  any  manner  of  bribe  ?  He  is 
honest.  Well  then  choose  him  by  acclamation. 
And  they  go  home  and  tell  their  wives  with  great 
satisfaction  what  a  good  thing  they  have  done. 
But  they  forgot  to  ask  the  fourth  question,  not  less 
important  than  either  of  the  others,  and  without 
which  the  others  do  not  avail.  Has  he  a  will? 
Can  he  carry  his  points  against  opposition  ?  Prob- 
ably not.  It  is  not  sufficient  that  your  work  fol- 
lows your  genius,  or  is  organic,  to  give  you  the 
magnetic  power  over  men.  More  than  taste  and 
talent  must  go  to  the  Will.  That  must  also  be  a 
gift  of  nature.  It  is  in  some  ;  it  is  not  in  others. 
But  I  should  say,  if  it  is  not  in  you,  you  had  bet- 
ter not  put  yourself  in  places  where  not  to  have  it 
is  to  be  a  public  enemy. 

The  expectation  and  claims  of  mankind  indicate 
the  duties  of  this  class.  Some  service  they  must 
pay.  We  do  not  expect  them  to  be  saints,  and  it 
is  very  pleasing  to  see  the  instinct  of  mankind  on 
this  matter,  —  how  much  they  will  forgive  to  such 
as  pay  substantial  service  and  work  energetically 
after  their  kind ;  but  they  do  not  extend  the  same 
indulgence  to  those  who  claim  and  enjoy  the  same 
prerogative  but  render  no  returns.  The  day  is 
darkened  when  the  golden  river  runs  down  into 
mud  ;  when   genius   grows  idle  and  wanton  and 


54  ARISTOCRACY. 

reckless  of  its  fine  duties  of  being  Saint,  Prophet, 
Inspirer  to  its  humble  fellows,  baulks  their  respect 
and  confounds  their  understanding  by  silly  extrav- 
agances. To  a  right  aristocracy,  to  Hercules,  to 
Theseus,  Odin,  the  Cid,  Napoleon;  to  Sir  Rob- 
ert Walpole,  to  Fox,  Chatham,  Mirabeau,  Jefferson, 
O'Connell ;  —  to  the  men,  that  is,  who  are  incom- 
parably superior  to  the  populace  in  ways  agreeable 
to  the  populace,  showing  them  the  way  they  should 
go,  doing  for  them  what  they  wish  done  and  cannot 
do ;  —  of  course  everything  will  be  permitted  and 
pardoned,  —  gaming,  drinking,  fighting,  luxury. 
These  are  the  heads  of  party,  who  can  do  no  wrong, 
—  everything  short  of  infamous  crime  will  pass. 
But  if  those  who  merely  sit  in  their  places  and 
are  not,  like  them,  able;  if  the  dressed  and  per- 
fumed gentleman,  who  serves  the  people  in  no  wise 
and  adorns  them  not,  is  not  even  not  afraid  of 
them,  if  suc]i  an  one  go  about  to  set  ill  examples 
and  corrupt  them,  who  shall  blame  them  if  they 
burn  his  barns,  insult  his  children,  assault  his  per- 
son, and  express  their  unequivocal  indignation  and 
contempt  ?  He  eats  their  bread,  he  does  not  scorn 
to  live  by  their  labor,  and  after  breakfast  he  can- 
not remember  that  there  are  human  beings.  To 
live  without  duties  is  obscene. 

2."  Genius,  what  is  so  called  in  strictness,  — ■  the 
power  to  affect  the  Imagination,  as  possessed  by 


ARISTOCRACY.  55 

the  orator,  the  poet,  the  novelist,  or  the  artist,  — 
has  a  royal  right  in  all  possessions  and  privileges, 
being  itself  representative  and  accepted  by  all  men 
as  their  delegate.  It  has  indeed  the  best  right, 
because  it  raises  men  above  themselves,  intoxicates 
them  with  beauty.  They  are  honored  by  render- 
ing  it  honor,  and  the  reason  of  this  allowance  is 
that  Genius  unlocks  for  all  men  the  chains  of  use, 
temperament  and  drudgery,  and  gives  them  a  sense 
of  delicious  liberty  and  power. 

The  first  example  that  occurs  is  an  extraordinary 
gift  of  eloquence.  A  man  who  has  that  possession 
of  his  means  and  that  magnetism  that  he  can  at 
all  times  carry  the  convictions  of  a  public  assembly, 
we  must  respect,  and  he  is  thereby  ennobled.  He 
has  the  freedom  of  the  city.  He  is  entitled  to  neg- 
lect trifles.  Like  a  great  general,  or  a  great  poet, 
or  a  millionaire,  he  may  wear  his  coat  out  at  el- 
bows, and  his  hat  on  his  feet,  if  he  will.  He  has 
established  relation,  representativeness.  The  best 
feat  of  genius  is  to  bring  all  the  varieties  of  talent 
and  culture  into  its  audience;  the  mediocre  and 
the  dull  are  reached  as  well  as  the  intelligent.  I 
have  seen  it  conspicuously  shown  in  a  village. 
Here  are  classes  which  day  by  day  have  no  inter- 
course, nothing  beyond  perhaps  a  surly  nod  in 
passing.  But  I  have  seen  a  man  of  teeming  brain 
come  among  these  men,  so  full  of  his  facts,  so  un- 


56  ARISTOCRACY. 

able  to  suppress  them,  that  he  has  poured  out  a 
river  of  knowledge  to  all  comers,  and  drawing  all 
these  men  round  him,  all  sorts  of  men,  interested 
the  whole  village,  good  and  bad,  bright  and  stupid, 
in  his  facts  ;  the  iron  boundary  lines  had  all  faded 
away;  the  stupid  had  discovered  that  they  were 
not  stupid  ;  the  coldest  had  found  themselves 
drawn  to  their  neighbors  by  interest  in  the  same 
things.     This  was  a  naturalist. 

The  more  familiar  examples  of  this  power  cer- 
tainly are  those  who  establish  a  wider  dominion 
over  men's  minds  than  any  speech  can ;  who  think, 
and  paint,  and  laugh,  and  weep,  in  their  eloquent 
closets,  and  then  convert  the  world  into  a  huge 
whispering  gallery,  to  report  the  tale  to  all  men, 
and  win  smiles  and  tears  from  many  generations. 
The  eminent  examples  are  Shakspeare,  Cervan- 
tes, Bunyan,  Burns,  Scott,  and  now  we  must  add 
Dickens.  In  the  fine  arts,  I  find  none  in  the  pres- 
ent age  who  have  any  popular  power,  who  have 
achieved  any  nobility  by  ennobling  the  people. 

3.  Elevation  of  sentiment,  refining  and  inspiring 
the  manners,  must  really  take  the  place  of  every 
distinction  whether  of  material  power  or  of  intel- 
lectual gifts.  The  manners  of  course  must  have 
that  depth  and  firmness  of  tone  to  attest  their  cen- 
trality  in  the  nature  of  the  man.  I  mean  the 
things  themselves  shall  be  judges,  and  determine. 


ARISTOCRACY.  57 

In  the  presence  of  this  nobility  even  genius  must 
stand  aside.  For  the  two  poles  of  nature  are 
Beauty  and  Meanness,  and  noble  sentiment  is  the 
highest  form  of  Beauty.  He  is  beautiful  in  face, 
in  port,  in  manners,  who  is  absorbed  in  objects 
which  he  truly  believes  to  be  superior  to  himself . 
Is  there  any  parchment  or  any  cosmetic  or  any 
blood  that  can  obtain  homage  like  that  security  of 
air  presupposing  so  undoubtingly  the  sympathy  of 
men  in  his  designs?  What  is  it  that  makes  the 
true  knight  ?  Loyalty  to  his  thought.  That  makes 
the  beautiful  scorn,  the  elegant  simplicity,  the  di- 
rectness, the  commanding  port  which  all  men 
admire  and  which  men  not  noble  affect.  For  the 
thought  has  no  debts,  no  hunger,  no  lusts,  no  low 
obligations  or  relations,  no  intrigue  or  business,  no 
murder,  no  envy,  no  crime,  but  large  leisures  and 
an  inviting  future. 

The  service  we  receive  from  the  great  is  a  mu- 
tual deference.  If  you  deal  with  the  vulgar,  life  is 
reduced  to  beggary  indeed.  The  astronomers  are 
very  eager  to  know  whether  the  moon  has  an  at- 
mosphere ;  I  am  only  concerned  that  every  man 
have  one.  I  observe  however  that  it  takes  two  to 
make  an  atmosphere.  I  am  acquainted  with  per- 
sons who  go  attended  with  this  ambient  cloud.  It 
is  sufficient  that  they  come.  It  is  not  important 
what  they  say.     The  sun  and  the  evening  sky  are 


58  ARISTOCRACY. 

not  calmer.  They  seem  to  have  arrived  at  the 
fact,  to  have  got  rid  of  the  show,  and  to  be  serene. 
Their  manners  and  behavior  in  the  house  and  in 
the  field  are  those  of  men  at  rest :  what  have  they 
to  conceal  ?  what  have  they  to  exhibit  ?  Others  I 
meet,  who  have  no  deference,  and  who  denude  and 
strip  one  of  all  attributes  but  material  values.  As 
much  health  and  muscle  as  you  have,  as  much  land, 
as  much  house-room  and  dinner,  avails.  Of  course 
a  man  is  a  poor  bag  of  bones.  There  is  no  gra- 
cious interval,  not  an  inch  allowed.  Bone  rubs 
against  bone.  Life  is  thus  a  Beggar's  Bush.  I 
know  nothing  which  induces  so  base  and  forlorn  a 
feeling  as  when  we  are  treated  for  our  utilities,  as 
economists  do,  starving  the  imagination  and  the 
sentiment.  In  this  impoverishing  animation,  I 
seem  to  meet  a  Hunger,  a  wolf.  Rather  let  us  be 
alone  whilst  we  live,  than  encounter  these  lean 
kine.  Man  should  emancipate  man.  He  does  so, 
not  by  jamming  him,  but  by  distancing  him.  The 
nearer  my  friend,  the  more  spacious  is  our  realm, 
the  more  diameter  our  spheres  have.  It  is  a  meas- 
ure of  culture,  the  number  of  things  taken  for 
granted.  When  a  man  begins  to  speak,  the  churl 
will  take  him  up  by  disputing  his  first  words,  so  he 
cannot  come  at  his  scope.  The  wise  man  takes  all 
for  granted  until  he  sees  the  parallelism  of  that 
which  puzzled  him  with  his  own  view. 


ARISTOCRACY.  59 

I  will  not  protract  this  discourse  by  describing 
the  duties  of  the  brave  and  generous.  And  yet  I 
will  venture  to  name  one,  and  the  same  is  almost 
the  sole  condition  on  which  knighthood  is  to  be 
won  ;  this,  namely,  loyalty  to  your  own  order.  The 
true  aristocrat  is  he  who  is  at  the  head  of  his  own 
order,  and  disloyalty  is  to  mistake  other  chivalries 
for  his  own.  Let  him  not  divide  his  homage,  but 
stand  for  that  which  he  was  born  and  set  to  main- 
tain. It  was  objected  to  Gustavus  that  he  did  not 
better  distinguish  between  the  duties  of  a  carabine 
and  a  general,  but  exposed  himself  to  all  dangers 
and  was  too  prodigal  of  a  blood  so  precious.  For 
a  soul  on  which  elevated  duties  are  laid  will  so 
realize  its  special  and  lofty  duties  as  not  to  be  in 
danger  of  assuming  through  a  low  generosity  those 
which  do  not  belong  to  it. 

There  are  all  degrees  of  nobility,  but  amid  the 
levity  and  giddiness  of  people  one  looks  round,  as 
for  a  tower  of  strength,  on  some  self-dependent 
mind,  who  does  not  go  abroad  for  an  estimate,  and 
has  long  ago  made  up  its  conclusion  that  it  is  im- 
possible to  fail.  The  great  Indian  sages  had  a 
lesson  for  the  Brahmin,  which  every  day  returns  to 
mind,  "  All  that  depends  on  another  gives  pain  ; 
all  that  depends  on  himself  gives  pleasure ;  in  these 
few  words  is  the  definition  of  pleasure  and  pain." 
The  noble  mind  is  here  to  teach  us  that  failure  is 


60  ARISTOCRACY. 

a  part  of  success.  Prosperity  and  pound-cake  are 
for  very  young  gentlemen,  whom  such  things  con- 
tent ;  but  a  hero's,  a  man's  success  is  made  up  of 
failures,  because  he  experiments  and  ventures  every 
day,  and  "  the  more  falls  he  gets,  moves  faster  on;" 
defeated  all  the  time  and  yet  to  victory  born.  I 
have  heard  that  in  horsemanship  he  is  not  the  good 
rider  who  never  was  thrown,  but  rather  that  a  man 
never  will  be  a  good  rider  until  he  is  thrown  ;  then 
he  will  not  be  haunted  any  longer  by  the  terror 
that  he  shall  tumble,  and  will  ride ;  —  that  is  his 
business,  —  to  ride,  whether  with  falls  or  whether 
with  none,  to  ride  unto  the  place  whither  he  is 
bound.  And  I  know  no  such  unquestionable  badge 
and  ensign  of  a  sovereign  mind,  as  that  tenacity 
of  purpose  which,  through  all  change  of  compan- 
ions, of  parties,  of  fortunes,  —  changes  never,  bates 
no  jot  of  heart  or  hope,  but  wearies  out  opposition, 
and  arrives  at  its  port.  In  his  consciousness  of  de- 
serving success,  the  caliph  Ali  constantly  neglected 
the  ordinary  means  of  attaining  it ;  and  to  the 
grand  interests,  a  superficial  success  is  of  no  ac- 
count. It  prospers  as  well  in  mistake  as  in  luck, 
in  obstruction  and  nonsense,  as  well  as  among  the 
angels ;  it  reckons  fortunes  mere  paint ;  difficulty 
is  its  delight :  perplexity  is  its  noonday :  minds 
that  make  their  way  without  winds  and  against 
tides.     But  these  are  rare  and  difficult  examples, 


ARISTOCRACY.  61 

we  can  only  indicate  them  to  show  how  high  is  the 
range  of  the  realm  of  Honor. 

I  know  the  feeling  of  the  most  ingenious  and  ex- 
cellent youth  in  America  ;  I  hear  the  complaint  of 
the  aspirant  that  we  have  no  prizes  offered  to  the 
ambition  of  virtuous  young  men ;  that  there  is  no 
Theban  Band ;  no  stern  exclusive  Legion  of  Honor, 
to  be  entered  only  by  long  and  real  service  and  pa- 
tient climbing  up  all  the  steps.  We  have  a  rich 
men's  aristocracy,  plenty  of  bribes  for  those  who 
like  them  ;  but  a  grand  style  of  culture,  which, 
without  injury,  an  ardent  youth  can  propose  to 
himself  as  a  Pharos  through  long  dark  years,  does 
not  exist,  and  there  is  no  substitute.  The  youth, 
having  got  through  the  first  thickets  that  oppose  his 
entrance  into  life,  having  got  into  decent  society,  is 
left  to  himself,  and  falls  abroad  with  too  much  free- 
dom. But  in  the  hours  of  insight  we  rally  against 
this  skepticism.  We  then  see  that  if  the  ignorant 
are  around  us,  the  great  are  much  more  near  ;  that 
there  is  an  order  of  men,  never  quite  absent,  who 
enroll  no  names  in  their  archives  but  of  such  as  are 
capable  of  truth.  They  are  gathered  in  no  one 
chamber ;  no  chamber  would  hold  them ;  but,  out 
of  the  vast  duration  of  man's  race,  they  tower  like 
mountains,  and  are  present  to  every  mind  in  pro- 
portion to  its  likeness  to  theirs.  The  solitariest 
man  who  shares  their  spirit  walks  environed  by 


62  ARISTOCRACY. 

them;  they  talk  to  liim,  they  comfort  him,  and 
happy  is  he  who  prefers  these  associates  to  profane 
companions.  They  also  take  shape  in  men,  in 
women.  There  is  no  heroic  trait,  no  sentiment  or 
thought  that  will  not  sometime  embody  itself  in  the 
form  of  a  friend.  That  highest  good  of  rational 
existence  is  always  coming  to  such  as  reject  mean 
alliances. 

One  trait  more  we  must  celebrate,  the  self- 
reliance  which  is  the  patent  of  royal  natures.  It 
is  so  prized  a  jewel  that  it  is  sure  to  be  tested. 
The  rules  and  discipline  are  ordered  for  that.  The 
Golden  Table  never  lacks  members  ;  all  its  seats 
are  kept  full ;  but  with  this  strange  provision,  that 
the  members  are  carefully  withdrawn  into  deep 
niches,  so  that  no  one  of  them  can  see  any  other  of 
them,  and  each  believes  himself  alone.  In  the 
presence  of  the  Chapter  it  is  easy  for  each  member 
to  carry  himself  royally  and  well ;  but  in  the  ab- 
sence of  his  colleagues  and  in  the  presence  of  mean 
people  he  is  tempted  to  accept  the  low  customs  of 
towns.  The  honor  of  a  member  consists  in  an  in- 
differency  to  the  persons  and  practices  about  him, 
and  in  the  pursuing  undisturbed  the  career  of  a 
Brother,  as  if  always  in  their  presence,  and  as  if  no 
other  existed.  Give  up,  once  for  all,  the  hope  of 
approbation  from  the  people  in  the  street,  if  you 
are  pursuing  great  ends.  How  can  they  guess  your 
designs  ? 


ARISTOCRACY.  63 

All  reference  to  models,  all  comparison  with 
neighboring  abilities  and  reputations,  is  the  road 
to  mediocrity.  The  generous  soul,  on  arriving  in 
a  new  port,  makes  instant  preparation  for  a  new 
voyage.  By  experiment,  by  original  studies,  by 
secret  obedience,  he  has  made  a  place  for  himself 
in  the  world ;  stands  there  a  real,  substantial,  un- 
precedented person,  and  when  the  great  come  by, 
as  always  there  are  angels  walking  in  the  earth, 
they  know  him  at  sight.  Effectual  service  in  his 
own  legitimate  fashion  distinguishes  the  true  man. 
For  he  is  to  know  that  the  distinction  of  a  royal 
nature  is  a  great  heart ;  that  not  Louis  Quatorze, 
not  Chesterfield,  nor  Byron,  nor  Bonaparte  is  the 
model  of  the  Century,  but,  wherever  found,  the  old 
renown  attaches  to  the  virtues  of  simple  faith  and 
staunch  endurance  and  clear  perception  and  plain 
speech,  and  that  there  is  a  master  grace  and  dig- 
nity communicated  by  exalted  sentiments  to  a  hu- 
man form,  to  which  utility  and  even  genius  must 
do  homage.  And  it  is  the  sign  and  badge  of  this 
nobility,  the  drawing  his  counsel  from  his  own 
breast.  For  to  every  gentleman,  grave  and  dan- 
gerous duties  are  proposed.  Justice  always  wants 
champions.  The  world  waits  for  him  as  its  de- 
fender, for  he  will  find  in  the  well-dressed  crowd, 
yes,  in  the  civility  of  whole  nations,  vulgarity  of 
sentiment.     In  the  best  parlors  of  modern  society 


64  ARISTOCRACY. 

he  will  find  the  laughing  devil,  the  civil  sneer ;  in 
English  palaces  the  London  twist,  derision,  cold- 
ness, contempt  of  the  masses,  contempt  of  Ireland, 
dislike  of  the  Chartist.  The  English  House  of 
Commons  is  the  proudest  assembly  of  gentlemen  in 
the  world,  yet  the  genius  of  the  House  of  Commons, 
its  legitimate  expression,  is  a  sneer.  In  America 
he  shall  find  deprecation  of  purism  on  all  questions 
touching  the  morals  of  trade  and  of  social  customs, 
and  the  narrowest  contraction  of  ethics  to  the  one 
duty  of  paying  money.  Pay  that,  and  you  may 
play  the  tyrant  at  discretion  and  never  look  back 
to  the  fatal  question,  —  where  had  you  the  money 
that  you  paid  ? 

I  know  the  difficulties  in  the  way  of  the  man  of 
honor.  The  man  of  honor  is  a  man  of  taste  and 
humanity.  By  tendency,  like  all  magnanimous 
men,  he  is  a  democrat.  But  the  revolution  comes, 
and  does  he  join  the  standard  of  Chartist  and  out- 
law ?  No,  for  these  have  been  dragged  in  their 
ignorance  by  furious  chiefs  to  the  Red  Revolu- 
tion ;  they  are  full  of  murder,  and  the  student  re- 
coils,—  and  joins  the  rich.  If  he  cannot  vote  with 
the  poor,  he  should  stay  by  himself.  Let  him  ac- 
cept the  position  of  armed  neutrality,  abhorring  the 
crimes  of  the  Chartist,  abhorring  the  selfishness  of 
the  rich,  and  say,  '  The  time  will  come  when  these 
poor  enfans  perdus  of   revolution  will   have   in- 


ARISTOCRACY.  65 

structed  their  party,  if  only  by  their  fate,  and  wiser 
counsels  will  prevail ;  the  music  and  the  dance  of 
liberty  will  come  up  to  bright  and  holy  ground  and 
will  take  me  in  also.  Then  I  shall  not  have  for- 
feited my  right  to  speak  and  act  for  mankind.' 
Meantime  shame  to  the  fop  of  learning  and  philos- 
ophy who  suffers  a  vulgarity  of  speech  and  habit 
to  blind  him  to  the  grosser  vulgarity  of  pitiless 
selfishness,  and  to  hide  from  him  the  current  of 
Tendency ;  who  abandons  his  right  position  of  be- 
ing priest  and  poet  of  these  impious  and  unpoetic 
doers  of  God's  work.  You  must,  for  wisdom,  for 
sanity,  have  some  access  to  the  mind  and  heart  of 
the  common  humanity.  The  exclusive  excludes 
himself.  No  great  man  has  existed  who  did  not 
rely  on  the  sense  and  heart  of  mankind  as  repre- 
sented by  the  good  sense  of  the  people,  as  correct- 
ing the  modes  and  over-refinements  and  class-preju- 
dices of  the  lettered  men  of  the  world. 

There  are  certain  conditions  in  the  highest  de- 
gree favorable  to  the  tranquillity  of  spirit  and  to 
that  magnanimity  we  so  prize.  And  mainly  the 
habit  of  considering  large  interests,  and  things  in 
masses,  and  not  too  much  in  detail.  The  habit 
of  directing  large  affairs  generates  a  nobility  of 
thought  in  every  mind  of  average  ability.  For  af- 
fairs themselves  show  the  way  in  which  they  should 
be  handled ;  and  a  good  head  soon  grows  wise,  and 
does  not  govern  too  much. 

VOL.  X.  5 


66  ARISTOCRACY. 

Now  I  believe  in  the  closest  affinity  between 
moral  and  material  power.  Virtue  and  genius  are 
always  on  the  direct  way  to  the  control  of  the  soci- 
ety in  which  they  are  found.  It  is  the  interest  of 
society  that  good  men  should  govern,  and  there  is 
always  a  tendency  so  to  place  them.  But,  for  the 
day  that  now  is,  a  man  of  generous  spirit  will  not 
need  to  administer  public  offices  or  to  direct  large 
interests  of  trade,  or  war,  or  politics,  or  manufac- 
ture, but  he  will  use  a  high  prudence  in  the  con- 
duct of  life  to  guard  himself  from  being  dissipated 
on  many  things.  There  is  no  need  that  he  should 
count  the  pounds  of  property  or  the  numbers  of 
agents  whom  his  influence  touches ;  it  suffices  that 
his  aims  are  high,  that  the  interest  of  intellectual 
and  moral  beings  is  paramount  with  him,  that  he 
comes  into  what  is  called  fine  society  from  higher 
ground,  and  he  has  an  elevation  of  habit  which 
ministers  of  empires  will  be  forced  to  see  and  to 
remember. 

I  do  not  know  whether  that  word  Gentleman, 
although  it  signifies  a  leading  idea  in  recent  civili- 
zation, is  a  sufficiently  broad  generalization  to  con- 
vey the  deep  and  grave  fact  of  self-reliance.  To 
many  the  word  expresses  only  the  outsides  of  culti- 
vated men,  —  only  graceful  manners,  and  independ- 
ence in  trifles  ;  but  the  fountains  of  that  thought 
are  in  the  deeps  of  man,  a  beauty  which  reaches 


ARISTOCRACY.  67 

through  and  through,  from  the  manners  to  the  soul ; 
an  honor  which  is  only  a  name  for  sanctity,  a  self- 
trust  which  is  a  trust  in  God  himself.  Call  it  man 
of  honor,  or  call  it  Man,  the  American  who  would 
serve  his  country  must  learn  the  beauty  and  honor 
of  perseverance,  he  must  reinforce  himself  by  the 
power  of  character,  and  revisit  the  margin  of  that 
well  from  which  his  fathers  drew  waters  of  life  and 
enthusiasm,  the  fountain  I  mean  of  the  moral  sen- 
timents, the  parent  fountain  from  which  this  goodly 
Universe  flows  as  a  wave. 


PERPETUAL  FORCES, 


"More  servants  wait  on  man 
Than  he  11  take  notice  of." 

George  Herbert. 


Ever  the  Rock  of  Ages  melts 

Into  the  mineral  air, 
To  be  the  quarry  whence  is  built 

Thought  and  its  mansions  fair0 


PERPETUAL  FORCES.1 


The  hero  in  the  fairy  tales  has  a  servant  who  can 
eat  granite  rocks,  another  who  can  hear  the  grass 
grow,  and  a  third  who  can  run  a  hundred  leagues 
in  half  an  hour  ;  so  man  in  nature  is  surrounded 
by  a  gang  of  friendly  giants  who  can  accept  harder 
stints  than  these,  and  help  him  in  every  kind. 
Each  by  itself  has  a  certain  omnipotence,  but  all, 
like  contending  kings  and  emperors,  in  the  presence 
of  each  other,  are  antagonized  and  kept  polite  and 
own  the  balance  of  power. 

We  cannot  afford  to  miss  any  advantage.  Never 
was  any  man  too  strong  for  his  proper  work.  Art 
is  long,  and  life  short,  and  he  must  supply  this  dis- 
proportion by  borrowing  and  applying  to  his  task 
the  energies  of  Nature.  Reinforce  his  self-respect, 
show  him  his  means,  his  arsenal  of  forces,  physical, 
metaphysical,  immortal.  Show  him  the  riches  of 
the  poor,  show  him  what  mighty  allies  and  helpers 
he  has.  And  though  King  David  had  no  good 
from  making  his  census  out  of  vain-glory,  yet  I  find 

1  Reprinted  from  the  North  American  Review,  No.  125,  1877. 


72  PERPETUAL  FORCES. 

it  wholesome  and  invigorating  to  enumerate  the  re- 
sources we  can  command,  to  look  a  little  into  this 
arsenal,  and  see  how  many  rounds  of  ammunition, 
what  muskets,  and  how  many  arms  better  than 
Springfield  muskets,  we  can  bring  to  bear. 

Go  out  of  doors  and  get  the  air.  Ah,  if  you 
knew  what  was  in  the  air.  See  what  your  robust 
neighbor,  who  never  feared  to  live  in  it,  has  got 
from  it ;  strength,  cheerfulness,  power  to  convince, 
heartiness  and  equality  to  each  event. 

All  the  earths  are  burnt  metals.  One  half  the 
avoirdupois  of  the  rocks  which  compose  the  solid 
crust  of  the  globe  consists  of  oxygen.  The  ada- 
mant is  always  passing  into  smoke ;  the  marble 
column,  the  brazen  statue  burn  under  the  day- 
light, and  would  soon  decompose  if  their  molec- 
ular structure,  disturbed  by  the  raging  sunlight, 
were  not  restored  by  the  darkness  of  the  night. 
What  agencies  of  electricity,  gravity,  light,  affin- 
ity combine  to  make  every  plant  what  it  is,  and  in 
a  manner  so  quiet  that  the  presence  of  these  tre- 
mendous powers  is  not  ordinarily  suspected.  Fara- 
day said, "  A  grain  of  water  is  known  to  have  elec- 
tric relations  equivalent  to  a  very  powerful  flash  of 
lightning."  The  ripe  fruit  is  dropped  at  last  with- 
out violence,  but .  the  lightning  fell  and  the  storm 
raged,  and  strata  were  deposited  and  uptorn  and 
bent  back,   and   Chaos   moved   from   beneath,  to 


PERPETUAL  FORCES.  73 

create  and  flavor  the  fruit  on  your  table  to-day. 
The  winds  and  the  rains  come  back  a  thousand 
and  a  thousand  times.  The  coal  on  your  grate 
gives  out  in  decomposing  to-day  exactly  the  same 
amount  of  light  and  heat  which  was  taken  from  the 
sunshine  in  its  formation  in  the  leaves  and  boughs 
of  the  antediluvian  tree. 

Take  up  a  spadeful  or  a  buck-load  of  loam ;  who 
can  guess  what  it  holds  ?  But  a  gardener  knows 
that  it  is  full  of  peaches,  full  of  oranges,  and  he 
drops  in  a  few  seeds  by  way  of  keys  to  unlock  and 
combine  its  virtues  ;  lets  it  lie  in  sun  and  rain,  and 
by  and  by  it  has  lifted  into  the  air  its  full  weight 
in  golden  fruit. 

The  earliest  hymns  of  the  world  were  hymns  to 
these  natural  forces.  The  Vedas  of  India,  which 
have  a  date  older  than  Homer,  are  hymns  to  the 
winds,  to  the  clouds,  and  to  fire.  They  all  have 
certain  properties  which  adhere  to  them,  such  as 
conservation,  persisting  to  be  themselves,  impossi- 
bility of  being  warped.  The  sun  has  lost  no  beams, 
the  earth  no  elements ;  gravity  is  as  adhesive,  heat 
as  expansive,  light  as  joyful,  air  as  virtuous,  water 
as  medicinal  as  on  the  first  day.  There  is  no  loss, 
only  transference.  When  the  heat  is  less  here  it  is 
not  lost,  but  more  heat  is  there.  When  the  rain 
exceeds  on  the  coast,  there  is  drought  on  the  prairie, 
When  the  continent  sinks,  the  opposite  continent, 


74  PERPETUAL  FORCES. 

that  is  to  say,  the  opposite  shore  of  the  ocean,  rises. 
When  life  is  less  here,  it  spawns  there. 

These  forces  are  in  an  ascending  series,  but  seem 
to  leave  no  room  for  the  individual ;  man  or  atom, 
he  only  shares  them ;  he  sails  the  way  these  irre= 
sistible  winds  blow.  But  behind  all  these  are  finer 
elements,  the  sources  of  them,  and  much  more 
rapid  and  strong ;  a  new  style  and  series,  the  spirit- 
ual. Intellect  and  morals  appear  only  the  material 
forces  on  a  higher  plane.  The  laws  of  material 
nature  run  up  into  the  invisible  world  of  the  mind, 
and  hereby  we  acquire  a  key  to  those  sublimities 
which  skulk  and  hide  in  the  caverns  of  human  con- 
sciousness. And  in  the  impenetrable  mystery 
which  hides  —  and  hides  through  absolute  transpar- 
ency —  the  mental  nature,  I  await  the  insight  which 
our  advancing  knowledge  of  material  laws  shall 
furnish. 

But  the  laws  of  force  apply  to  every  form  of  it. 
The  husbandry  learned  in  the  economy  of  heat  or 
light  or  steam  or  muscular  fibre  applies  precisely 
to  the  use  of  wit.  What  I  have  said  of  the  inexor- 
able persistence  of  every  elemental  force  to  remain 
itself,  the  impossibility  of  tampering  with  it  or 
warping  it,  —  the  same  rule  applies  again  strictly 
to  this  force  of  intellect ;  that  it  is  perception,  a  see- 
ing, not  making,  thoughts.  The  man  must  bend  to 
the  lav/,  never  the  law  to  him. 


PERPETUAL  FORCES.  1$ 

The  brain  of  man  has  methods  and  arrangement  p> 
corresponding  to  these  material  powers,  by  which 
he  can  use  them.  See  how  trivial  is  the  use  of  the 
world  by  any  other  of  its  creatures.  Whilst  these 
forces  act  on  us  from  the  outside  and  we  are  not  in 
their  counsel,  we  call  them  Fate.  The  animal  in- 
stincts guide  the  animal  as  gravity  governs  the  stone, 
and  in  man  that  bias  or  direction  of  his  constitution 
is  often  as  tyrannical  as  gravity.  We  call  it  tem- 
perament, and  it  seems  to  be  the  remains  of  wolf, 
ape,  and  rattlesnake  in  him.  While  the  reason  is 
yet  dormant,  this  rules ;  as  the  reflective  faculties 
open,  this  subsides.  We  come  to  reason  and  knowl- 
edge ;  we  see  the  causes  of  evils  and  learn  to  parry 
them  and  use  them  as  instruments,  by  knowledge, 
being  inside  of  them  and  dealing  with  them  as  the 
Creator  does.  It  is  curious  to  see  how  a  creature 
so  feeble  and  vulnerable  as  a  man,  who,  unarmed, 
is  no  match  for  the  wild  beasts,  tiger,  or  crocodile, 
none  for  the  frost,  none  for  the  sea,  none  for  a  fog, 
or  a  damp  air,  or  the  feeble  fork  of  a  poor  worm,  — 
each  of  a  thousand  petty  accidents  puts  him  to 
death  every  day,  —  is  yet  able  to  subdue  to  his  will 
these  terrific  forces,  and  more  than  these.  His 
whole  frame  is  responsive  to  the  world,  part  for 
part,  every  sense,  every  pore  to  a  new  element,  so 
that  he  seems  to  have  as  many  talents  as  there  are 
qualities  in  nature.    No  force  but  is  his  force.     He 


76  PERPETUAL  FORCES. 

does  not  possess  them,  he  is  a  pipe  through  which 
their  currents  flow.  If  a  straw  be  held  still  in  the 
direction  of  the  ocean-current,  the  sea  will  pour 
through  it  as  through  Gibraltar.  If  he  should 
measure  strength  with  them,  if  he  should  fight  the 
sea  and  the  whirlwind  with  his  ship,  he  would  snap 
his  spars,  tear  his  sails,  and  swamp  his  bark ;  but 
by  cunningly  dividing  the  force,  tapping  the  tem- 
pest for  a  little  side-wind,  he  uses  the  monsters,  and 
they  carry  him  where  he  would  go.  Look  at  him  ; 
you  can  give  no  guess  at  what  power  is  in  him. 
It  never  appears  directly,  but  follow  him  and  see 
his  effects,  see  his  productions.  Pie  is  a  planter,  a 
miner,  a  shipbuilder,  a  machinist,  a  musician,  a 
steam-engine,  a  geometer,  an  astronomer,  a  per- 
suader of  men,  a  lawgiver,  a  builder  of  towns  ;  — 
and  each  of  these  by  dint  of  a  wonderful  method  or 
series  that  resides  in  him  and  enables  him  to  work 
on  the  material  elements. 

We  are  surrounded  by  human  thought  and  labor. 
Where  are  the  farmer's  days  gone  ?  See,  they  are 
hid  in  that  stone-wall,  in  that  excavated  trench,  in 
the  harvest  grown  on  what  was  shingle  and  pine- 
barren.  He  put  his  days  into  carting  from  the  dis- 
tant swamp  the  mountain  of  muck  which  has  been 
trundled  about  until  it  now  makes  the  cover  of  fruit- 
ful soil.  Labor  hides  itself  in  every  mode  and  form. 
It  is  massed  and  blocked  away  in  that  stone  house, 


PERPETUAL  FORCES.  11 

for  five  hundred  years.  It  is  twisted  and  screwed 
into  fragrant  hay  which  fills  the  barn.  It  surprises  in 
the  perfect  form  and  condition  of  trees  clean  of  cat- 
erpillars and  borers,  rightly  pruned,  and  loaded 
with  grafted  fruit.  It  is  under  the  house  in  the 
well ;  it  is  over  the  house  in  slates  and  copper  and 
water-spout ;  it  grows  in  the  corn ;  it  delights  us 
in  the  flower-bed ;  it  keeps  the  cow  out  of  the  gar- 
den, the  rain  out  of  the  library,  the  miasma  out  of 
the  town.  It  is  in  dress,  in  pictures,  in  ships,  in 
cannon  ;  in  every  spectacle,  in  odors,  in  flavors,  in 
sweet  sounds,  in  works  of  safety,  of  delight,  of 
wrath,  of  science. 

The  thoughts,  no  man  ever  saw,  but  disorder 
becomes  order  where  he  goes  ;  weakness  becomes 
power ;  surprising  and  admirable  effects  follow  him 
like  a  creator.  All  forces  are  his ;  as  the  wise  mer- 
chant by  truth  in  his  dealings  finds  his  credit  un- 
limited, —  he  can  use  in  turn,  as  he  wants  it,  all 
the  property  in  the  world,  —  so  a  man  draws  on 
all  the  air  for  his  occasions,  as  if  there  were  no 
other  breather  ;  on  all  the  water  as  if  there  were  no 
other  sailor ;  he  is  warmed  by  the  sun,  and  so  of 
every  element ;  he  walks  and  works  by  the  aid  of 
gravitation  ;  he  draws  on  all  knowledge  as  his  prov- 
ince, on  all  beauty  for  his  innocent  delight,  and 
first  or  last  he  exhausts  by  his  use  all  the  harvests, 
all  the  powers  of  the  world.     For  man,  the  receiver 


78  PERPETUAL  FORCES. 

of  all,  and  depositary  of  these  volumes  of  power,  1 
arn  to  say  that  his  ability  and  performance  are  ac- 
cording to  his  reception  of  these  various  streams  of 
force.  We  define  Genius  to  be  a  sensibility  to  all 
the  impressions  of  the  outer  world,  a  sensibility  so 
equal  that  it  receives  accurately  all  impressions,  and 
can  truly  report  them,  without  excess  or  loss,  as  it 
received.  It  must  not  only  receive  all,  but  it  must 
render  all.  And  the  health  of  man  is  an  equality 
of  inlet  and  outlet,  gathering  and  giving.  Any 
hoarding  is  tumor  and  disease. 

If  we  were  truly  to  take  account  of  stock  before 
the  last  Court  of  Appeals,  —  that  were  an  inven- 
tory !  What  are  my  resources  ?  "  Our  stock  in 
life,  our  real  estate,  is  that  amount  of  thought 
which  we  have  had,"  —  and  which  we  have  ap- 
plied, and  so  domesticated.  The  ground  we  have 
thus  created  is  forever  a  fund  for  new  thoughts. 
A  few  moral  maxims  confirmed  by  much  experi- 
ence would  stand  high  on  the  list,  constituting  a 
supreme  prudence.  Then  the  knowledge  unutter- 
able of  our  private  strength,  of  where  it  lies,  of  its 
accesses  and  facilitations,  and  of  its  obstructions. 
My  conviction  of  principles,  —  that  is  great  part  of 
my  possessions.  Certain  thoughts,  certain  obser- 
vations, long  familiar  to  me  in  night-watches  and 
daylights,  would  be  my  capital  if  I  removed  to 
Spain  or  China,  or,  by  stranger  translation,  to  the 


PERPETUAL  FORCES.  79 

planet  Jupiter  or  Mars,  or  to  new  spiritual  socie- 
ties. Every  valuable  person  who  joins  in  an  enter- 
prise, —  is  it  a  piece  of  industry,  or  the  founding 
of  a  colony  or  a  college,  the  reform  of  some  public 
abuse,  or  some  effort  of  patriotism,  —  what  he 
chiefly  brings,  all  he  brings,  is  not  his  land  or  his 
money  or  body's  strength,  but  his  thoughts,  his  way 
of  classifying  and  seeing  things,  his  method.  And 
thus  with  every  one  a  new  power.  In  proportion 
to  the  depth  of  the  insight  is  the  power  and  reach 
of  the  kingdom  he  controls. 

It  would  be  easy  to  awake  wonder  by  sketching 
the  performance  of  each  of  these  mental  forces  ;  as 
of  the  diving-bell  of  the  Memory,  which  descends 
into  the  deeps  of  our  past  and  oldest  experience 
and  brings  up  every  lost  jewel;  or  of  the  Fancy, 
which  sends  its  gay  balloon  aloft  into  the  sky  to 
catch  every  tint  and  gleam  of  romance;  of  the 
Imagination,  which  turns  every  dull  fact  into  pic- 
tures and  poetry,  by  making  it  an  emblem  of 
thought.  What  a  power,  when,  combined  with  the 
analyzing  understanding,  it  makes  Eloquence  ;  the 
art  of  compelling  belief,  the  art  of  marking  peoples' 
hearts  dance  to  his  pipe !  And  not  less,  method, 
patience,  self-trust,  perseverance,  love,  desire  of 
knowledge,  the  passion  for  truth.  These  are  the 
angels  that  take  us  by  the  hand,  these  our  immor- 
tal, invulnerable  guardians,     By  their  strength  we 


80  PERPETUAL  FORCES, 

are  strong,  and  on  the  signal  occasions  in  our  ca- 
reer their  inspirations  flow  to  us  and  make  the  self- 
ish and  protected  and  tenderly-bred  person  strong 
for  his  duty,  wise  in  counsel,  skilful  in  action,  com- 
petent to  rule,  willing  to  obey. 

I  delight  in  tracing  these  wonderful  powers,  the 
electricity  and  gravity  of  the  human  world.  The 
power  of  persistence,  of  enduring  defeat  and  of 
gaining  victory  by  defeats,  is  one  of  these  forces 
which  never  loses  its  charm.  The  power  of  a  man 
increases  steadily  by  continuance  in  one  direction. 
He  becomes  acquainted  with  the  resistances,  and 
with  his  own  tools ;  increases  his  skill  and  strength 
and  learns  the  favorable  moments  and  favorable 
accidents.  He  is  his  own  apprentice,  and  more 
time  gives  a  great  addition  of  power,  just  as  a  fall- 
ing body  acquires  momentum  with  every  foot  of 
the  fall.  How  we  prize  a  good  continuer !  I 
knew  a  manufacturer  who  found  his  property  in- 
vested in  chemical  works  which  were  depreciating 
in  value.  He  undertook  the  charge  of  them  him- 
self, began  at  the  beginning,  learned  chemistry  and 
acquainted  himself  with  all  the  conditions  of  the 
manufacture.  His  friends  dissuaded  him,  advised 
him  to  give  up  the  work,  which  was  not  suited  to 
the  country.  Why  throw  good  money  after  bad? 
But  he  persisted,  and  after  many  years  succeeded 
in  his  production  of  the  right  article  for  commerce, 


PERPETUAL  FORCES.  81 

brought  up  the  stock  of  his  mills  to  par,  and  then 
sold  out  his  interest,  having  accomplished  the  re- 
form that  was  required. 

In  each  the  talent  is  the  perception  of  an  order 
and  series  in  the  department  he  deals  with,  —  of 
an  order  and  series  which  pre-existed  in  nature, 
and  which  this  mind  sees  and  conforms  to.  The 
geometer  shows  us  the  true  order  in  figures ;  the 
painter  in  laws  of  color;  the  dancer  in  grace. 
Bonaparte,  with  his  celerity  of  combination,  mute, 
unfathomable,  reads  the  geography  of  Europe  as  if 
his  eyes  were  telescopes;  his  will  is  an  immense 
battery  discharging  irresistible  volleys  of  power 
always  at  the  right  point  in  the  right  time. 

There  was  a  story  in  the  journals  of  a  poor  pris- 
oner in  a  Western  police-court  who  was  told  he 
might  be  released  if  he  would  pay  his  fine.  He 
had  no  money,  he  had  no  friends,  but  he  took  his 
flute  out  of  his  pocket  and  began  to  play,  to  the 
surprise,  and,  as  it  proved,  to  the  delight  of  all  the 
company;  the  jurors  waked  up,  the  sheriff  forgot 
his  duty,  the  judge  himself  beat  time,  and  the  pris- 
oner was  by  general  consent  of  court  and  officers 
allowed  to  go  his  way  without  any  money.  And  I 
suppose,  if  he  could  have  played  loud  enough,  we 
here  should  have  beat  time,  and  the  whole  popula- 
tion of  the  globe  would  beat  time,  and  consent  that 
he  should  go  without  his  fine. 


82  PERPETUAL  FORCES. 

I  knew  a  stupid  young  farmer,  churlish,  living 
only  for  his  gains,  and  with  whom  the  only  inter- 
course you  could  have  was  to  buy  what  he  had  to 
sell.  One  day  I  found  his  little  boy  of  four  years 
dragging  about  after  him  the  prettiest  little  wooden 
cart,  so  neatly  built,  and  with  decorations  too,  and 
learned  that  Papa  had  made  it ;  that  hidden  deep 
in  that  thick  skull  was  this  gentle  art  and  taste 
which  the  little  fingers  and  caresses  of  his  son  had 
the  power  to  draw  out  into  day ;  he  was  no  peasant 
after  all.  So  near  to  us  is  the  flowering  of  Fine 
Art  in  the  rudest  population.  See  in  a  circle  of 
school-girls  one  with  no  beauty,  no  special  viva- 
city, —  but  she  can  so  recite  her  adventures  that 
she  is  never  alone,  but  at  night  or  at  morning 
wherever  she  sits  the  inevitable  circle  gathers 
around  her,  willing  prisoners  of  that  wonderful 
memory  and  fancy  and  spirit  of  life.  Would  you 
know  where  to  find  her  ?  Listen  for  the  laughter, 
follow  the  cheerful  hum,  see  where  is  the  rapt  at- 
tention, and  a  pretty  crowd  all  bright  with  one  elec- 
tricity ;  there  in  the  centre  of  fellowship  and  joy  is 
Scheherazade  again. 

See  how  rich  life  is ;  rich  in  private  talents,  each 
of  which  charms  us  in  turn  and  seems  the  best.  If 
we  hear  music  we  give  up  all  to  that ;  if  we  fall  in 
with  a  cricket-club  and  see  the  game  masterly 
played,  the  best  player  is  the  first  of  men  ;  if  we 


PERPETUAL  FORCES.  83 

go  to  the  regatta,  we  forget  the  bowler  for  the 
stroke  oar  ;  and  when  the  soldier  comes  home  from 
the  fight,  he  fills  all  eyes.  But  the  soldier  has  the 
same  admiration  of  the  great  parliamentary  de- 
bater. And  poetry  and  literature  are  disdainful  of 
all  these  claims  beside  their  own.  Like  the  boy 
who  thought  in  turn  each  one  of  the  four  seasons 
the  best,  and  each  of  the  three  hundred  and  sixty- 
five  days  in  the  year  the  crowner.  The  sensibility 
is  all. 

Every  one  knows  what  are  the  effects  of  music 
to  put  people  in  gay  or  mournful  or  martial  mood. 
But  these  are  the  effects  on  dull  subjects,  and  only 
the  hint  of  its  power  on  a  keener  sense.  It  is 
a  stroke  on  a  loose  or  tense  cord.  The  story  of 
Orpheus,  of  Arion,  of  the  Arabian  minstrel,  are  not 
fables,  but  experiments  on  the  same  iron  at  white 
heat. 

By  this  wondrous  susceptibility  to  all  the  impres- 
sions of  Nature  the  man  finds  himself  the  recepta- 
cle of  celestial  thoughts,  of  happy  relations  to  all 
men.  The  imagination  enriches  him,  as  if  there 
were  no  other ;  the  memory  opens  all  her  cabinets 
and  archives ;  Science  her  length  and  breadth ; 
Poetry  her  splendor  and  joy  and  the  august  circles 
of  eternal  law.  These  are  means  and  stairs  for  new 
ascensions  of  the  mind.  But  they  are  nowise  im- 
poverished for  any  other  mind,  not  tarnished,  not 


84  PERPETUAL  FORCES. 

breathed  upon ;  for  the  mighty  Intellect  did  no^ 
stoop  to  him  and  become  property,  but  he  rose  to  it 
and  followed  its  circuits.  "  It  is  ours  while  we  use 
it,  it  is  not  ours  when  we  do  not  use  it." 

And  so,  one  step  higher,  when  he  comes  into  the 
realm  of  sentiment  and  will.  He  sees  the  grand- 
eur of  justice,  the  victory  of  love,  the  eternity  that 
belongs  to  all  moral  nature.  He  does  not  then  in- 
vent his  sentiment  or  his  act,  but  obeys  a  pre-exist- 
ing right  which  he  sees.  We  arrive  at  virtue  by 
taking  its  direction  instead  of  imposing  ours. 

The  last  revelation  of  intellect  and  of  sentiment 
is  that  in  a  manner  it  severs  the  man  from  all  other 
men ;  makes  known  to  him  that  the  spiritual  powers 
are  sufficient  to  him  if  no  other  being  existed; 
that  he  is  to  deal  absolutely  in  the  world,  as  if  he 
alone  were  a  system  and  a  state,  and  though  all 
should  perish  could  make  all  anew. 

The  forces  are  infinite.  Every  one  has  the  might 
of  all,  for  the  secret  of  the  world  is  that  its  energies 
are  solidaires ;  that  they  work  together  on  a  sys- 
tem of  mutual  aid,  all  for  each  and  each  for  all ; 
that  the  strain  made  on  one  point  bears  on  every 
arch  and  foundation  of  the  structure.  But  if  you 
wish  to  avail  yourself  of  their  might,  and  in  like 
manner  if  you  wish  the  force  of  the  intellect,  the 
force  of  the  will,  you  must  take  their  divine  direc- 
tion, not  they  yours.     Obedience  alone  gives  the 


PERPETUAL  FORCES.  85 

right  to  command.  It  is  like  the  village  operator 
who  taps  the  telegraph-wire  and  surprises  the  se- 
crets of  empires  as  they  pass  to  the  capital.  So 
this  child  of  the  dust  throws  himself  by  obedience 
into  the  circuit  of  the  heavenly  wisdom,  and  shares 
the  secret  of  God. 

Thus  is  the  world  delivered  into  your  hand,  but 
on  two  conditions,  —  not  for  property,  but  for  use, 
use  according  to  the  noble  nature  of  the  gifts  ;  and 
not  for  toys,  not  for  self-indulgence.  Things  work 
to  their  ends,  not  to  yours,  and  will  certainly  defeat 
any  adventurer  who  fights  against  this  ordination. 

The  effort  of  men  is  to  use  them  for  private  ends. 
They  wish  to  pocket  land  and  water  and  fire  and 
air  and  all  fruits  of  these,  for  property,  and  would 
like  to  have  Aladdin's  lamp  to  compel  darkness, 
and  iron-bound  doors,  and  hostile  armies,  and  lions 
and  serpents  to  serve  them  like  footmen.  And  they 
wish  the  same  service  from  the  spiritual  faculties. 
A  man  has  a  rare  mathematical  talent,  inviting  him 
to  the  beautiful  secrets  of  geometry,  and  wishes  to 
clap  a  patent  on  it ;  or  has  the  fancy  and  inven- 
tion of  a  poet,  and  says,  '  I  will  write  a  play  that 
shall  be  repeated  in  London  a  hundred  nights ; ' 
or  a  military  genius,  and  instead  of  using  that  to 
defend  his  country,  he  says,  4I  will  fight  the  bat- 
tle so  as  to  give  me  place  and  political  considera- 
tion ; '    or  Canning  or  Thurlow  has  a  genius  of  de- 


86  PERPETUAL  FORCES. 

bate,  and  says,  '  I  will  know  how  with  this  weapon 
to  defend  the  cause  that  will  pay  best  and  make  me 
Chancellor  or  Foreign  Secretary.'  But  this  per- 
version is  punished  with  instant  loss  of  true  wis- 
dom and  real  power. 

I  find  the  survey  of  these  cosmical  powers  a  doc- 
trine of  consolation  in  the  dark  hours  of  private  or 
public  fortune.  It  shows  us  the  world  alive,  guided, 
incorruptible ;  that  its  cannon  cannot  be  stolen  nor 
its  virtues  misapplied.  It  shows  us  the  long  Prov- 
idence, the  safeguards  of  rectitude.  It  animates 
exertion ;  it  warns  us  out  of  that  despair  into  which 
Saxon  men  are  prone  to  fall,  —  out  of  an  idolatry 
of  forms,  instead  of  working  to  simple  ends,  in  the 
belief  that  Heaven  always  succors  us  in  working  for 
these.  This  world  belongs  to  the  energetical.  It 
is  a  fagot  of  laws,  and  a  true  analysis  of  these  laws, 
showing  how  immortal  and  how  self-protecting  they 
are,  would  be  a  wholesome  lesson  for  every  time 
and  for  this  time.  That  band  which  ties  them  to- 
gether is  unity,  is  universal  good,  saturating  all 
with  one  being  and  aim,  so  that  each  translates  the 
other,  is  only  the  same  spirit  applied  to  new  de- 
partments. Things  are  saturated  with  the  moral 
law.  There  is  no  escape  from  it.  Violets  and 
grass  preach  it;  rain  and  snow,  wind  and  tides, 
every  change,  every  cause  in  Nature  is  nothing  but 
a  disguised  missionary. 


PERPETUAL  FORCES.  87 

All  our  political  disasters  grow  as  logically  out 
of  our  attempts  in  the  past  to  do  without  justice,  as 
the  sinking  of  some  part  of  your  house  comes  of  de- 
fect in  the  foundation.  One  thing  is  plain  ;  a  cer- 
tain personal  virtue  is  essential  to  freedom  ;  and  it 
begins  to  be  doubtful  whether  our  corruption  in 
this  country  has  not  gone  a  little  over  the  mark  of 
safety,  so  that  when  canvassed  we  shall  be  found  to 
be  made  up  of  a  majority  of  reckless  self-seekers. 
The  divine  knowledge  has  ebbed  out  of  us  and  we 
do  not  know  enough  to  be  free. 

I  hope  better  of  the  state.  Half  a  man's  wisdom 
goes  with  his  courage.  A  boy  who  knows  that  a 
bully  lives  round  the  corner  which  he  must  pass 
on  his  daily  way  to  school,  is  apt  to  take  sinister 
views  of  streets  and  of  school-education.  And  a 
sensitive  politician  suffers  his  ideas  of  the  part  New 
York  or  Pennsylvania  or  Ohio  are  to  play  in  the 
future  of  the  Union,  to  be  fashioned  by  the  elec- 
tion of  rogues  in  some  counties.  But  we  must  not 
gratify  the  rogues  so  deeply.  There  is  a  speedy 
limit  to  profligate  politics. 

Fear  disenchants  life  and  the  world.  If  I  have 
not  my  own  respect  I  am  an  impostor,  not  entitled 
to  other  men's,  and  had  better  creep  into  my  grave 
I  admire  the  sentiment  of  Thoreau,  who  said, 
"  Nothing  is  so  much  to  be  feared  as  fear ;  God 
himself  likes  atheism  better."     For  the  world  is  a 


88  PERPETUAL  FORCES. 

battle-ground;  every  principle  is  a  war-note,  and 
the  most  quiet  and  protected  life  is  at  any  moment 
exposed  to  incidents  which  test  your  firmness,  The 
illusion  that  strikes  me  as  the  masterpiece  in  that 
ring  of  illusions  which  our  life  is,  is  the  timidity 
with  which  we  assert  our  moral  sentiment,  We 
are  made  of  it,  the  world  is  built  by  it,  things  en- 
dure as  they  share  it ;  all  beauty,  all  health,  all  in- 
telligence exist  by  it;  yet  we  shrink  to  speak  of 
it  or  to  range  ourselves  by  its  side.  Nay,  we  pre- 
sume strength  of  him  or  them  who  deny  it.  Cit- 
ies go  against  it ;  the  college  goes  against  it,  the 
courts  snatch  at  any  precedent,  at  any  vicious  form 
of  law  to  rule  it  out ;  legislatures  listen  with  appe- 
tite to  declamations  against  it,  and  vote  it  down. 
Every  new  asserter  of  the  right  surprises  us,  like  a 
man  joining  the  church,  and  we  hardly  dare  believe 
he  is  in  earnest. 

What  we  do  and  suffer  is  in  moments,  but  the 
cause  of  right  for  which  we  labor  never  dies,  works 
in  long  periods,  can  afford  many  checks,  gains  by 
our  defeats,  and  will  know  how  to  compensate  our 
extremest  sacrifice.  Wrath  and  petulance  may  have 
their  short  success,  but  they  quickly  reach  their 
brief  elate  and  decompose,  whilst  the  massive  might 
of  ideas  is  irresistible  at  last.  Whence  does  the 
knowledge  come  ?  Where  is  the  source  of  power  ? 
The  soul  of  God  is  poured  into  the  world  throu  gh 


PERPETUAL  FORCES.  89 

the  thoughts  of  men.  The  world  stands  on  ideas, 
and  not  on  iron  or  cotton  ;  and  the  iron  of  iron,  the 
fire  of  fire,  the  ether  and  source  of  all  the  elements 
is  moral  force.  As  cloud  on  cloud,  as  snow  on 
snow,  as  the  bird  on  the  air,  and  the  planet  on  space 
in  its  flight,  so  do  nations  of  men  and  their  insti- 
tutions rest  on  thoughts. 


CHAEACTER. 


Shun  passion,  fold  the  hands  of  thrift, 

Sit  still,  and  Truth  is  near  ; 

Suddenly  it  will  uplift 

Your  eyelids  to  the  sphere : 
Wait  a  little,  you  shall  see 
The  portraiture  of  things  to  be. 


For  what  need  I  of  book  or  priest 
Or  Sibyl  from  the  mummied  East 
When  every  star  is  Bethlehem  Star,  - 
I  count  as  many  as  there  are 
Cinquefoils  or  violets  in  the  grass, 
So  many  saints  and  saviours, 
So  many  high  behaviours. 


CHARACTER.1 


Morals  respects  what  men  call  goodness,  that 
which  all  men  agree  to  honor  as  justice,  truth- 
speaking,  good-will  and  good  works.  Morals  re- 
spects the  source  or  motive  of  this  action.  It  is 
the  science  of  substances,  not  of  shows.  It  is  the 
what,  and  not  the  how.  It  is  that  which  all  men 
profess  to  regard,  and  by  their  real  respect  for 
which  recommend  themselves  to  each  other. 

There  is  this  eternal  advantage  to  morals,  that, 
in  the  question  between  truth  and  goodness,  the 
moral  cause  of  the  world  lies  behind  all  else  in  the 
mind.  It  was  for  good,  it  is  to  good,  that  all 
works.  Surely  it  is  not  to  prove  or  show  the 
truth  of  things,  —  that  sounds  a  little  cold  and 
scholastic,  —  no,  it  is  for  benefit,  that  all  subsists. 
As  we  say  in  our  modern  politics,  catching  at  last 
the  language  of  morals,  that  the  object  of  the  State 
is  the  greatest  good  of  the  greatest  number,  —  so, 
the  reason  we  must  give  for  the  existence  of  the 
world  is,  that  it  is  for  the  benefit  of  all  being. 
1  Reprinted  from  the  North  American  Review  of  April,  1866\ 


94  CHARACTER. 

Morals  implies  freedom  and  will.  The  will  con- 
stitutes the  man.  He  has  his  life  in  Nature,  like  a 
beast :  but  choice  is  born  in  him ;  here  is  he  that 
chooses ;  here  is  the  Declaration  of  Independence, 
the  July  Fourth  of  zoology  and  astronomy.  He 
chooses,  —  as  the  rest  of  the  creation  does  not. 
But  will,  pure  and  perceiving,  is  not  wilfulness. 
When  a  man,  through  stubbornness,  insists  to  do 
this  or  that,  something  absurd  or  whimsical,  only 
because  he  will,  he  is  weak  ;  he  blows  with  his  lips 
against  the  tempest,  he  dams  the  incoming  ocean 
with  his  cane.  It  were  an  unspeakable  calamity 
if  any  one  should  think  he  had  the  right  to  impose 
a  private  will  on  others.  That  is  the  part  of  a 
striker,  an  assassin.  All  violence,  all  that  is  dreary 
and  repels,  is  not  power  but  the  absence  of  power. 

Morals  is  the  direction  of  the  will  on  universal 
ends.  He  is  immoral  who  is  acting  to  any  private 
end.  He  is  moral,  —  we  say  it  with  Marcus  Aure- 
lius  and  with  Kant,  —  whose  aim  or  motive  may 
become  a  universal  rule,  binding  on  all  intelligent 
beings ;  and  with  Yauvenargues,  "  the  mercenary 
sacrifice  of  the  public  good  to  a  private  interest  is 
the  eternal  stamp  of  vice." 

All  the  virtues  are  special  directions  of  this  mo- 
tive ;  justice  is  the  application  of  this  good  of  the 
whole  to  the  affairs  of  each  one ;  courage  is  con- 
tempt of  danger  in  the  determination  to  see  this 


CHARACTER.  95 

good  of  the  whole  enacted ;  love  is  delight  in  the 
preference  of  that  benefit  redounding  to  another 
over  the  securing  of  our  own  share  ;  humility  is  a 
sentiment  of  our  insignificance  when  the  benefit  of 
the  universe  is  considered. 

If  from  these  external  statements  we  seek  to 
©ome  a  little  nearer  to  the  fact,  our  first  experi- 
ences in  moral  as  in  intellectual  nature  force  us  to 
discriminate  a  universal  mind,  identical  in  all  men. 
Certain  biases,  talents,  executive  skills,  are  special 
to  each  individual;  but  the  high,  contemplative, 
all-commanding  vision,  the  sense  of  Right  and 
Wrong,  is  alike  in  all.  Its  attributes  are  self-ex- 
istence, eternity,  intuition  and  command.  It  is  the 
mind  of  the  mind.  We  belong  to  it,  not  it  to  us. 
It  is  in  all  men,  and  constitutes  them  men.  In  bad 
men  it  is  dormant,  as  health  is  in  men  entranced  or 
drunken ;  but,  however  inoperative,  it  exists  under- 
neath whatever  vices  and  errors.  The  extreme 
simplicity  of  this  intuition  embarrasses  every  at- 
tempt at  analysis.  We  can  only  mark,  one  by  one, 
the  perfections  which  it  combines  in  every  act.  It 
admits  of  no  appeal,  looks  to  no  superior  essence. 
It  is  the  reason  of  things. 

The  antagonist  nature  is  the  individual,  formed 
into  a  finite  body  of  exact  dimensions,  with  appe- 
tites which  take  from  everybody  else  what  they  ap- 
propriate to  themselves,  and  would  enlist  the  entire 


96  CHARACTER. 

spiritual  faculty  of  the  individual,  if  it  were  pos- 
sible, in  catering  for  them.  On  the  perpetual  con- 
flict between  the  dictate  of  this  universal  mind  and 
the  wishes  and  interests  of  the  individual,  the 
moral  discipline  of  life  is  built.  The  one  craves  a 
private  benefit,  which  the  other  requires  him  to  re- 
nounce out  of  respect  to  the  absolute  good.  Every 
hour  puts  the  individual  in  a  position  where  his 
wishes  aim  at  something  which  the  sentiment  of 
duty  forbids  him  to  seek.  He  that  speaks  the 
truth  executes  no  private  function  of  an  individual 
will,  but  the  world  utters  a  sound  by  his  lips.  He 
who  doth  a  just  action  seeth  therein  nothing  of  his 
own,  but  an  inconceivable  nobleness  attaches  to  it, 
because  it  is  a  dictate  of  the  general  mind.  We 
have  no  idea  of  power  so  simple  and  so  entire  as 
this.  It  is  the  basis  of  thought,  it  is  the  basis  of 
being.  Compare  all  that  we  call  ourselves,  all  our 
private  and  personal  venture  in  the  world,  with 
this  deep  of  moral  nature  in  which  we  lie,  and  our 
private  good  becomes  an  impertinence,  and  we  take 
part  with  hasty  shame  against  ourselves  :  — 

"  High  instincts,  before  which  our  mortal  nature 
Doth  tremble  like  a  guilty  thing  surprised,  — 
Which,  be  they  what  they  may, 
Are  yet  the  fountain-light  of  all  our  day, 
Are  yet  the  master-light  of  all  our  seeing,  — 
Uphold  us,  cherish,  and  have  power  to  make 
Our  noisy  years  seem  moments  in  the  being 


CHARACTER.  97 

Of  the  eternal  silence,  —  truths  that  wake 
To  perish  never." 

The  moral  element  invites  man  to  great  enlarge- 
ments, to  find  his  satisfaction,  not  in  particulars  or 
events,  but  in  the  purpose  and  tendency ;  not  in 
bread,  but  in  his  right  to  his  bread  ;  not  in  much 
corn  or  wool,  but  in  its  communication. 

Not  by  adding,  then,  does  the  moral  sentiment 
help  us ;  no,  but  in  quite  another  manner.  It  puts 
us  in  place.  It  centres,  it  concentrates  us.  It 
puts  us  at  the  heart  of  Nature,  where  we  belong,  in 
the  cabinet  of  science  and  of  causes,  there  where  all 
the  wires  terminate  which  hold  the  world  in  mag- 
netic unity,  and  so  converts  us  into  universal  be- 
ings. 

This  wonderful  sentiment,  which  endears  itself 
as  it  is  obeyed,  seems  to  be  the  fountain  of  intel- 
lect ;  for  no  talent  gives  the  impression  of  sanity, 
if  wanting  this ;  nay,  it  absorbs  everything  into 
itself.  Truth,  Power,  Goodness,  Beauty,  are  its 
varied  names,  —  faces  of  one  substance,  the  heart 
of  all.  Before  it,  what  are  persons,  prophets,  or 
seraphim  but  its  passing  agents,  momentary  rays 
of  its  light? 

The  moral  sentiment  is  alone  omnipotent. 
There  is  no  labor  or  sacrifice  to  which  it  will  not 
bring  a  man,  and  which  it  will  not  make  easy. 
Thus  there  is  no  man  who  will  bargain  to  sell  his 


98  CHARACTER. 

life,  say  at  the  end  of  a  year,  for  a  million  or  ten 
millions  of  gold  dollars  in  hand,  or  for  any  tempo- 
rary pleasures,  or  for  any  rank,  as  of  peer  or  prince  ; 
but  many  a  man  who  does  not  hesitate  to  lay  down 
his  life  for  the  sake  of  a  truth,  or  in  the  cause  of 
his  country,  or  to  save  his  son  or  his  friend.  And 
under  the  action  of  this  sentiment  of  the  Right, 
his  heart  and  mind  expand  above  himself,  and 
above  Nature. 

Though  Love  repine,  and  Reason  chafe, 
There  came  a  voice  without  reply,  — « 
"  'T  is  man's  perdition  to  be  safe, 

When  for  the  truth  he  ought  to  die." 

Such  is  the  difference  of  the  action  of  the  heart 
within  and  of  the  senses  without.  One  is  enthusi- 
asm, and  the  other  more  or  less  amounts  of  horse- 
power. 

Devout  men,  in  the  endeavor  to  express  their 
convictions,  have  used  different  images  to  suggest 
this  latent  force ;  as,  the  light,  the  seed,  the  Spirit, 
the  Holy  Ghost,  the  Comforter,  the  Daemon,  the 
still,  small  voice,  etc.,  —  all  indicating  its  power 
and  its  latency.  It  is  serenely  above  all  mediation. 
In  all  ages,  to  all  men,  it  saith,  I  am  ;  and  he  who 
hears  it  feels  the  impiety  of  wandering  from  this 
revelation  to  any  record  or  to  any  rival.  The  poor 
Jews  of  the  wilderness  cried :  "  Let  not  the  Lord 
speak  to  us;  let  Moses  speak  to  us."      But  the 


CHARACTER.  99 

simple  and  sincere  soul  makes  the  contrary  prayer : 
'  Let  no  intruder  come  between  thee  and  me  ;  deal 
Thou  with  me  ;  let  me  know  it  is  thy  will,  and  I 
ask  no  more.'  The  excellence  of  Jesus,  and  of 
every  true  teacher,  is,  that  he  affirms  the  Divinity 
in  him  and  in  us,  —  not  thrusts  himself  between  it 
and  us.  It  would  instantly  indispose  us  to  any 
person  claiming  to  speak  for  the  Author  of  Nature, 
the  setting  forth  any  fact  or  law  which  we  did  not 
find  in  our  consciousness.  We  should  say  with 
Heraclitus  :  "  Come  into  this  smoky  cabin ;  God  is 
here  also :  approve  yourself  to  him." 

We  affirm  that  in  all  men  is  this  majestic  per- 
ception and  command  ;  that  it  is  the  presence  of 
the  Eternal  in  each  perishing  man ;  that  it  dis- 
tances and  degrades  all  statements  of  whatever 
saints,  heroes,  poets,  as  obscure  and  confused  stam- 
merings before  its  silent  revelation.  They  report 
the  truth.  It  is  the  truth.  When  I  think  of  Rea- 
son, of  Truth,  of  Virtue,  I  cannot  conceive  them 
as  lodged  in  your  soul  and  lodged  in  my  soul,  but 
that  you  and  I  and  all  souls  are  lodged  in  that ; 
and  I  may  easily  speak  of  that  adorable  nature, 
there  where  only  I  behold  it  in  my  dim  experiences, 
in  such  terms  as  shall  seem  to  the  frivolous,  who 
dare  not  fathom  their  consciousness,  as  profane. 
How  is  a  man  a  man  ?  How  can  he  exist  to  weave 
relations  of  joy  and  virtue  with  other  souls,  but 


100  CHARACTER 

because  he  is  inviolable,  anchored  at  the  centre  of 
Truth  and  Being?  In  the  ever-returning  hour  of 
reflection,  he  says  :  '  I  stand  here  glad  at  heart  of 
all  the  sympathies  I  can  awaken  and  share,  cloth- 
ing myself  with  them  as  with  a  garment  of  shelter 
and  beauty,  and  yet  knowing  that  it  is  not  in  the 
power  of  all  who  surround  me  to  take  from  me  the 
smallest  thread  I  call  mine.  If  all  things  are  taken 
away,  I  have  still  all  things  in  my  relation  to  the 
Eternal.' 

We  pretend  not  to  define  the  way  of  its  access  to 
the  private  heart.  It  passes  understanding.  There 
was  a  time  when  Christianity  existed  in  one  child. 
But  if  the  child  had  been  killed  by  Herod,  would 
the  element  have  been  lost  ?  God  sends  his  mes- 
sage, if  not  by  one,  then  quite  as  well  by  another. 
When  the  Master  of  the  Universe  has  ends  to  ful- 
fill, he  impresses  his  will  on  the  structure  of  minds. 

The  Divine  Mind  imparts  itself  to  the  single 
person  :  his  whole  duty  is  to  this  rule  and  teaching. 
The  aid  which  others  give  us  is  like  that  of  the 
mother  to  the  child,  —  temporary,  gestative,  a 
short  period  of  lactation,  a  nurse's  or  a  governess's 
care ;  but  on  his  arrival  at  a  certain  maturity,  it 
ceases,  and  would  be  hurtful  and  ridiculous  if  pro- 
longed. Slowly  the  body  comes  to  the  use  of  its 
organs;  slowly  the  soul  unfolds  itself  in  the  new 
man.     It  is  partial  at  first,  and  honors  only  soma 


CHARACTER  101 

one  or  some  few  truths.  In  its  companions  it  sees 
other  truths  honored,  and  successively  finds  their 
foundation  also  in  itself.  Then  it  cuts  the  cord, 
and  no  longer  believes  "  because  of  thy  saying," 
but  because  it  has  recognized  them  in  itself. 

The  Divine  Mind  imparts  itself  to  the  single 
person  :  but  it  is  also  true  that  men  act  powerfully 
on  us.  There  are  men  who  astonish  and  delight, 
men  who  instruct  and  guide.  Some  men's  words 
I  remember  so  well  that  I  must  often  use  them  to 
express  my  thought.  Yes,  because  I  perceive  that 
we  have  heard  the  same  truth,  but  they  have  heard 
it  better.  That  is  only  to  say,  there  is  degree  and 
gradation  throughout  Nature  ;  and  the  Deity  does 
not  break  his  firm  laws  in  respect  to  imparting 
truth,  more  than  in  imparting  material  heat  and 
light.  Men  appear  from  time  to  time  who  receive 
with  more  purity  and  fulness  these  high  communi- 
cations. But  it  is  only  as  fast  as  this  hearing  from 
another  is  authorized  by  its  consent  with  his  own, 
that  it  is  pure  and  safe  to  each  ;  and  all  receiving 
from  abroad  must  be  controlled  by  this  immense 
reservation. 

It  happens  now  and  then,  in  the  ages,  that  a 
soul  is  born  which  has  no  weakness  of  self,  which 
offers  no  impediment  to  the  Divine  Spirit,  which 
comes  down  into  Nature  as  if  only  for  the  benefit 
of  souls,  and  all  its  thoughts  are  perceptions  of 


102  CHARACTER. 

things  as  they  are,  without  any  infirmity  of  earth. 
Such  souls  are  as  the  apparition  of  gods  among 
men,  and  simply  by  their  presence  pass  judgment 
on  them.  Men  are  forced  by  their  own  self-respect 
to  give  them  a  certain  attention.  Evil  men  shrink 
and  pay  involuntary  homage  by  hiding  or  apologiz- 
ing for  their  action. 

When  a  man  is  born  with  a  profound  moral  sen- 
timent, preferring  truth,  justice  and  the  serving  of 
all  men  to  any  honors  or  any  gain,  men  readily  feel 
the  superiority.  They  who  deal  with  him  are  ele- 
vated with  joy  and  hope  ;  he  lights  up  the  house  or 
the  landscape  in  which  he  stands.  His  actions  are 
poetic  and  miraculous  in  their  eyes.  In  his  pres- 
ence, or  within  his  influence,  every  one  believes  in 
the  immortality  of  the  soul.  They  feel  that  the 
invisible  world  sympathizes  with  him.  The  Ara- 
bians delight  in  expressing  the  sympathy  of  the  un- 
seen world  with  holy  men. 

When  Omar  prayed  and  loved, 

Where  Syrian  waters  roll, 
Aloft  the  ninth  heaven  glowed  and  moved 

To  the  tread  of  the  jubilant  soul. 

A  chief  event  of  life  is  the  day  in  which  we  have 
encountered  a  mind  that  startled  us  by  its  large 
scope.  I  am  in  the  habit  of  thinking,  —  not,  I  hope, 
out  of  a  partial  experience,  but  confirmed  by  what 
I  notice  in   many   lives,  —  that   to  every  serious 


CHARACTER.  103 

mind  Providence  sends  from  time  to  time  five  or 
six  or  seven  teachers  who  are  of  the  first  importance 
to  him  in  the  lessons  they  have  to  impart.  The 
highest  of  these  not  so  much  give  particular  knowl- 
edge, as  they  elevate  by  sentiment  and  by  their 
habitual  grandeur  of  view. 

Great  men  serve  us  as  insurrections  do  in  bad 
governments.  The  world  would  run  into  endless 
routine,  and  forms  incrust  forms,  till  the  life  was 
gone.  But  the  perpetual  supply  of  new  genius 
shocks  us  with  thrills  of  life,  and  recalls  us  to  prin- 
ciples. Lucifer's  wager  in  the  old  drama  was, 
"  There  is  no  steadfast  man  on  earth."  He  is  very 
rare.  "A  man  is  already  of  consequence  in  the 
world  when  it  is  known  that  we  can  implicitly  rely 
on  him."  See  how  one  noble  person  dwarfs  a  whole 
nation  of  underlings.  This  steadfastness  we  indi- 
cate when  we  praise  character. 

Character  denotes  habitual  self-possession,  habit- 
ual regard  to  interior  and  constitutional  motives, 
a  balance  not  to  be  overset  or  easily  disturbed  by 
outward  events  and  opinion,  and  by  implication 
points  to  the  source  of  right  motive.  We  some- 
times employ  the  word  to  express  the  strong  and 
consistent  will  of  men  of  mixed  motive,  but,  when 
used  with  emphasis,  it  points  to  what  no  events  can 
ehange,  that  is,  a  will  built  on  the  reason  of  things. 
Such  souls  do  not  come  in  troops  :  oftenest  appear 


104  CHARACTER. 

solitary,  like  a  general  without  his  command,  be« 
cause  those  who  can  understand  and  uphold  such 
appear  rarely,  not  many,  perhaps  not  one,  in  a  gen- 
eration. And  the  memory  and  tradition  of  such 
a  leader  is  preserved  in  some  strange  way  by 
those  who  only  half  understand  him,  until  a  true 
disciple  comes,  who  apprehends  and  interprets  every 
word. 

The  sentiment  never  stops  in  pure  vision,  but 
will  be  enacted.  It  affirms  not  only  its  truth,  but 
its  supremacy.  It  is  not  only  insight,  as  science, 
as  fancy,  as  imagination  is  ;  or  an  entertainment, 
as  friendship  and  poetry  are  ;  but  it  is  a  sovereign 
rule  :  and  the  acts  which  it  suggests  —  as  when  it 
impels  a  man  to  go  forth  and  impart  it  to  other 
men,  or  sets  him  on  some  asceticism  or  some  prac- 
tice of  self-examination  to  hold  him  to  obedience, 
or  some  zeal  to  unite  men  to  abate  some  nuisance, 
or  establish  some  reform  or  charity  which  it  com- 
mands—  are  the  homage  we  render  to  this  senti- 
ment, as  compared  with  the  lower  regard  we  pay  to 
other  thoughts  :  and  the  private  or  social  practices 
we  establish  in  its  honor  we  call  religion. 

The  sentiment,  of  course,  is  the  judge  and  meas- 
ure of  every  expression  of  it,  —  measures  Judaism, 
Stoicism,  Christianity,  Buddhism,  or  whatever 
philanthropy,  or  politics,  or  saint,  or  seer  pretends 
to  speak  in  its  name.     The  religions  we  call  false 


CHARACTER.  105 

were  once  true.  They  also  were  affirmations  of  the 
conscience  correcting  the  evil  customs  of  their  times. 
The  populace  drag  down  the  gods  to  their  own 
level,  and  give  them  their  egotism  ;  whilst  in  Na- 
ture is  none  at  all,  God  keeping  out  of  sight,  and 
known  only  as  pure  law,  though  resistless.  Cha- 
teaubriand said,  with  some  irreverence  of  phrase,  If 
God  made  man  in  his  image,  man  has  paid  him 
well  back.  "  Si  Dieu  a  fait  VJiomme  d  son  image, 
Vhomme  Va  bien  rendu."  Every  nation  is  de- 
graded by  the  goblins  it  worships  instead  of  this 
Deity.  The  Dionysia  and  Saturnalia  of  Greece 
and  Rome,  the  human  sacrifice  of  the  Druids,  the 
Sradda  of  Hindoos,  the  Purgatory,  the  Indulgences, 
and  the  Inquisition  of  Popery,  the  vindictive  my- 
thology of  Calvinism,  are  examples  of  this  perver- 
sion. 

Every  particular  instruction  is  speedily  embodied 
in  a  ritual,  is  accommodated  to  humble  and  gross 
minds,  and  corrupted.  The  moral  sentiment  is  the 
perpetual  critic  on  these  forms,  thundering  its  pro- 
test, sometimes  in  earnest  and  lofty  rebuke ;  but 
sometimes  also  it  is  the  source,  in  natures  less  pure, 
of  sneers  and  flippant  jokes  of  common  people,  who 
feel  that  the  forms  and  dogmas  are  not  true  for 
them,  though  they  do  not  see  where  the  error  lies. 

The  religion  of  one  age  is  the  literary  entertain- 
ment of  the  next,     We  use  in  our  idlest  poetry  and 


106  CHARACTER. 

discourse  the  words  Jove,  Neptune,  Mercury,  as 
mere  colors,  and  can  hardly  believe  that  they  had 
to  the  lively  Greek  the  anxious  meaning  which,  in 
our  towns,  is  given  and  received  in  churches  when 
our  religious  names  are  used  :  and  we  read  with 
surprise  the  horror  of  Athens  when,  one  morning, 
the  statues  of  Mercury  in  the  temples  were  found 
broken,  and  the  like  consternation  was  in  the  city 
as  if,  in  Boston,  all  the  Orthodox  churches  should 
be  burned  in  one  night. 

The  greatest  dominion  will  be  to  the  deepest 
thought.  The  establishment  of  Christianity  in  the 
world  does  not  rest  on  any  miracle  but  the  miracle 
of  being  the  broadest  and  most  humane  doctrine. 
Christianity  was  once  a  schism  and  protest  against 
the  impieties  of  the  time,  which  had  originally  been 
protests  against  earlier  impieties,  but  had  lost  their 
truth.  Varnhagen  von  Ense,  writing  in  Prussia 
in  1848,  says  :  "  The  Gospels  belong  to  the  most 
aggressive  writings.  No  leaf  thereof  could  attain 
the  liberty  of  being  printed  (in  Berlin)  to-day. 
What  Mirabeaus,  Rousseaus,  Diderots,  Fichtes, 
Heines,  and  many  another  heretic,  one  can  detect 
therein  ! " 

But  before  it  was  yet  a  national  religion  it  was 
alloyed,  and,  in  the  hands  of  hot  Africans,  of  luxu* 
rious  Byzantines,  of  fierce  Gauls,  its  creeds  were 
tainted  with  their  barbarism.    In  Holland,  in  Eng. 


CHARACTER.  107 

land,  in  Scotland,  it  felt  the  national  narrowness. 
How  unlike  our  habitual  turn  of  thought  was  that 
of  the  last  century  in  this  country  !  Our  ancestors 
spoke  continually  of  angels  and  archangels  with 
the  same  good  faith  as  they  would  have  spoken  of 
their  own  parents  or  their  late  minister.  Now  the 
words  pale,  are  rhetoric,  and  all  credence  is  gone. 
Our  horizon  is  not  far,  say  one  generation,  or  thirty 
years  :  we  all  see  so  much.  The  older  see  two  gen- 
erations, or  sixty  years.  But  what  has  been  run- 
ning on  through  three  horizons,  or  ninety  years, 
looks  to  all  the  world  like  a  law  of  Nature,  and 
't  is  an  impiety  to  doubt.  Thus,  't  is  incredible  to 
us,  if  we  look  into  the  religious  books  of  our  grand- 
fathers, how  they  held  themselves  in  such  a  pinfold. 
But  why  not  ?  As  far  as  they  could  see,  through 
two  or  three  horizons,  nothing  but  ministers  and 
ministers.  Calvinism  was  one  and  the  same  thing 
in  Geneva,  in  Scotland,  in  Old  and  New  England. 
If  there  was  a  wedding,  they  had  a  sermon  ;  if  a 
funeral,  then  a  sermon  ;  if  a  war,  or  small-pox,  or 
a  comet,  or  canker-worms,  or  a  deacon  died,  — 
still  a  sermon  :  Nature  was  a  pulpit ;  the  church- 
warden or  tithing-man  was  a  petty  persecutor ;  the 
presbytery,  a  tyrant ;  and  in  many  a  house  in  coun- 
try places  the  poor  children  found  seven  sabbaths 
in  a  week.  Fifty  or  a  hundred  years  ago,  prayers 
were  said,  morning  and  evening,  in  all  families  ; 


108  CHARACTER. 

grace  was  said  at  table ;  an  exact  observance  of 
the  Sunday  was  kept  in  the  houses  of  laymen  as 
of  clergymen.  And  one  sees  with  some  pain  the 
disuse  of  rites  so  charged  with  humanity  and  aspi- 
ration. But  it  by  no  means  follows,  because  those 
offices  are  much  disused,  that  the  men  and 
women  are  irreligious  ;  certainly  not  that  they 
have  less  integrity  or  sentiment,  but  only,  let  us 
hope,  that  they  see  that  they  can  omit  the  form 
without  loss  of  real  ground ;  perhaps  that  they  find 
some  violence,  some  cramping  of  their  freedom  of 
thought,  in  the  constant  recurrence  of  the  form. 

So  of  the  changed  position  and  manners  of  the 
clergy.  They  have  dropped,  with  the  sacerdotal 
garb  and  manners  of  the  last  century,  many  doc- 
trines and  practices  once  esteemed  indispensable  to 
their  order.  But.  the  distinctions  of  the  true  clergy- 
man are  not  less  decisive.  Men  ask  now,  "  Is  he 
serious  ?  Is  he  a  sincere  man,  who  lives  as  he 
teaches  ?  Is  he  a  benefactor  ?  "  So  far  the  relig- 
ion is  now  where  it  should  be.  Persons  are  discrim- 
inated as  honest,  as  veracious,  as  illuminated,  as 
helpful,  as  having  public  and  universal  regards,  or 
otherwise ;  —  are  discriminated  according  to  their 
aims,  and  not  by  these  ritualities. 

.  The  changes  are  inevitable  ;  the  new  age  cannot 
see  with  the  eyes  of  the  last.  But  the  change  is  in 
what  is  superficial ;  the  principles  are  immortal, 


CHARACTER.  109 

and  the  rally  on  the  principle  must  arrive  as  people 
become  intellectual.  I  consider  theology  to  be  the 
rhetoric  of  morals.  The  mind  of  this  age  has  fallen 
away  from  theology  to  morals.  I  conceive  it  an 
advance.  I  suspect,  that,  when  the  theology  was 
most  florid  and  dogmatic,  it  was  the  barbarism  of 
the  people,  and  that,  in  that  very  time,  the  best 
men  also  fell  away  from  theology,  and  rested  in 
morals.  I  think  that  all  the  dogmas  rest  on  mor- 
als, and  that  it  is  only  a  question  of  youth  or  ma- 
turity, of  more  or  less  fancy  in  the  recipient ;  that 
the  stern  determination  to  do  justly,  to  speak  the 
truth,  to  be  chaste  and  humble,  was  substantially 
the  same,  whether  under  a  self-respect,  or  under  a 
vow  made  on  the  knees  at  the  shrine  of  Madonna. 

When  once  Selden  had  said  that  the  priests 
seemed  to  him  to  be  baptizing  their  own  fingers, 
the  rite  of  baptism  was  getting  late  in  the  world. 
Or  when  once  it  is  perceived  that  the  English 
missionaries  in  India  put  obstacles  in  the  way  of 
schools,  (as  is  alleged,)  —  do  not  wish  to  enlighten 
but  to  Christianize  the  Hindoos,  —  it  is  seen  at 
once  how  wide  of  Christ  is  English  Christianity. 

Mankind  at  large  always  resemble  frivolous  chil- 
dren :  they  are  impatient  of  thought,  and  wish  to 
be  amused.  Truth  is  too  simple  for  us  ;  we  do  not 
like  those  who  unmask  our  illusions.  Fontenelle 
said :  "If  the  Deity  should  lay  bare  to  the  eyes  of 


110  CHARACTER 

men  the  secret  system  of  Nature,  the  causes  by 
which  all  the  astronomic  results  are  effected,  and 
they  finding  no  magic,  no  mystic  numbers,  no  fatal- 
ities, but  the  greatest  simplicity,  I  am  persuaded 
they  would  not  be  able  to  suppress  a  feeling  of 
mortification,  and  would  exclaim,  with  disappoint- 
ment, '  Is  that  all  ? '  '  And  so  we  paint  over  the 
bareness  of  ethics  with  the  quaint  grotesques  of 
theology. 

We  boast  the  triumph  of  Christianity  over  Pa- 
ganism, meaning  the  victory  of  the  spirit  over  the 
senses ;  but  Paganism  hides  itself  in  the  uniform 
of  the  Church.  Paganism  has  only  taken  the  oath 
of  allegiance,  taken  the  cross,  but  is  Paganism  still, 
outvotes  the  true  men  by  millions  of  majority,  car- 
ries the  bag,  spends  the  treasure,  writes  the  tracts, 
elects  the  minister,  and  persecutes  the  true  believer. 

There  is  a  certain  secular  progress  of  opinion, 
which,  in  civil  countries,  reaches  everybody.  One 
service  which  this  age  has  rendered  is,  to  make 
the  life  and  wisdom  of  every  past  man  accessible 
and  available  to  all.  Socrates  and  Marcus  Aurelius 
are  allowed  to  be  saints  ;  Mahoruet  is  no  longer 
accursed ;  Voltaire  is  no  longer  a  scarecrow  ;  Spi- 
noza has  come  to  be  revered.  u  The  time  will  come," 
says  Varnhagen  von  Ense,  "  when  we  shall  treat 
the  jokes  and  sallies  against  the  myths  and  church- 
rituals  of  Christianity  —  say  the  sarcasms  of  Voi 


CHARACTER.  Ill 

taire,  Frederic  the  Great,  and  D'  Alembert  —  good- 
naturedly  and  without  offence  :  since,  at  bottom, 
those  men  mean  honestly,  their  polemics  proceed 
out  of  a  religious  striving,  and  what  Christ  meant 
and  willed  is  in  essence  more  with  them  than  with 
their  opponents,  who  only  wear  and  misrepresent 

the  name  of  Christ Voltaire  was  an  apostle 

of  Christian  ideas  ;  only  the  names  were  hostile  to 
him,  and  he  never  knew  it  otherwise.  He  was  like 
the  son  of  the  vine-dresser  in  the  Gospel,  who  said 
No,  and  went ;  the  other  said  Yea,  and  went  not. 
These  men  preached  the  true  God,  —  Him  whom 
men  serve  by  justice  and  uprightness;  but  they 
called  themselves  atheists." 

When  the  highest  conceptions,  the  lessons  of  re- 
ligion, are  imported,  the  nation  is  not  culminating, 
has  not  genius,  but  is  servile.  A  true  nation  loves 
its  vernacular  tongue.  A  completed  nation  will  not 
import  its  religion.  Duty  grows  everywhere,  like 
children,  like  grass  ;  and  we  need  not  go  to  Europe 
or  to  Asia  to  learn  it.  I  am  not  sure  that  the  Eng- 
lish religion  is  not  all  quoted.  Even  the  Jeremy 
Taylors,  Fullers,  George  Herberts,  steeped,  all  of 
them,  in  Church  traditions,  are  only  using  their  fine 
fancy  to  emblazon  their  memory.  'T  is  Judaea,  not 
England,  which  is  the  ground.  So  with  the  mor- 
dant Calvinism  of  Scotland  and  America.  But  this 
quoting  distances  and  disables  them :   since   with 


112  CHARACTER. 

every  repeater  something  of  creative  force  is  lost,  as 
we  feel  when  we  go  back  to  each  original  moralist. 
Pythagoras,  Socrates,  the  Stoics,  the  Hindoo,  Beh« 
men,  George  Fox,  —  these  speak  originally;  and 
how  many  sentences  and  books  we  owe  to  unknown 
authors,  —  to  writers  who  were  not  careful  to  set 
down  name  or  date  or  titles  or  cities  or  postmarks 
in  these  illuminations  ! 

We,  in  our  turn,  want  power  to  drive  the  ponder- 
ous State.  The  constitution  and  law  in  America 
must  be  written  on  ethical  principles,  so  that  the  en- 
tire power  of  the  spiritual  world  can  be  enlisted  to 
hold  the  loyalty  of  the  citizen,  and  to  repel  every  en- 
emy as  by  force  of  Nature.  The  laws  of  old  empires 
stood  on  the  religious  convictions.  Now  that  their 
religions  are  outgrown,  the  empires  lack  strength. 
Romanism  in  Europe  does  not  represent  the  real 
opinion  of  enlightened  men.  The  Lutheran  Church 
does  not  represent  in  Germany  the  opinions  of  the 
universities.  In  England,  the  gentlemen,  the  jour- 
nals, and  now,  at  last,  churchmen  and  bishops,  have 
fallen  away  from  the  Anglican  Church.  And  in 
America,  where  are  no  legal  ties  to  churches,  the 
looseness  appears  dangerous. 

Our  religion  has  got  on  as  far  as  Unitarianism, 
But  all  the  forms  grow  pale.  The  walls  of  the  tem- 
ple are  wasted  and  thin,  and,  at  last,  only  a  film  of 
whitewash,  because  the  mind  of  our  culture  has  al< 


CHARACTER.  113 

ready  left  our  liturgies  behind.  "  Every  age,"  says 
Varnhagen,  "  has  another  sieve  for  the  religious 
tradition,  and  will  sift  it  out  again.  Something  is 
continually  lost  by  this  treatment,  which  posterity 
cannot  recover." 

But  it  is  a  capital  truth  that  Nature,  moral  as 
well  as  material,  is  always  equal  to  herself.  Ideas 
always  generate  enthusiasm.  The  creed,  the  leg- 
end,  forms  of  worship,  swiftly  decay.  Morals  is  the 
incorruptible  essence,  very  heedless  in  its  richness 
of  any  past  teacher  or  witness,  heedless  of  their 
lives  and  fortunes.  It  does  not  ask  whether  you 
are  wrong  or  right  in  your  anecdotes  of  them  ;  but 
it  is  all  in  all  how  you  stand  to  your  own  tribunal. 

The  lines  of  the  religious  sects  are  very  shifting ; 
their  platforms  unstable ;  the  whole  science  of  the- 
ology of  great  uncertainty,  and  resting  very  much 
on  the  opinions  of  who  may  chance  to  be  the  leading 
doctors  of  Oxford  or  Edinburgh,  of  Princeton  or 
Cambridge,  to-day.  No  man  can  tell  what  relig- 
ious revolutions  await  us  in  the  next  years ;  and  the 
education  in  the  divinity  colleges  may  well  hesi- 
tate and  vary.  But  the  science  of  ethics  has  no 
mutation ;  and  whoever  feels  any  love  or  skill  for 
ethical  studies  may  safely  lay  out  all  his  strength 
and  genius  in  working  in  that  mine.  The  pulpit 
may  shake,  but  this  platform  will  not.  All  the  vic- 
tories of  religion  belong  to  the  moral  sentiment 


114  CHARACTER. 

Some  poor  soul  beheld  the  Law  blazing  through 
such  impediments  as  he  had,  and  yielded  himself  to 
humility  and  joy.  What  was  gained  by  being  told 
that  it  was  justification  by  faith? 

The  Church,  in  its  ardor  for  beloved  persons, 
clings  to  the  miraculous,  in  the  vulgar  sense,  which 
has  even  an  immoral  tendency,  as  one  sees  in 
Greek,  Indian  and  Catholic  legends,  which  are  used 
to  gloze  every  crime.  The  soul,  penetrated  with 
the  beatitude  which  pours  into  it  on  all  sides,  asks 
no  interpositions,  no  new  laws,  —  the  old  are  good 
enough  for  it,  —  finds  in  every  cart-path  of  labor 
ways  to  heaven,  and  the  humblest  lot  exalted.  Men 
will  learn  to  put  back  the  emphasis  peremptorily 
on  pure  morals,  always  the  same,  not  subject  to 
doubtful  interpretation,  with  no  sale  of  indulgences 
no  massacre  of  heretics,  no  female  slaves,  no  disfran- 
chisement of  woman,  no  stigma  on  race ;  to  make 
morals  the  absolute  test,  and  so  uncover  and  drive 
out  the  false  religions.  There  is  no  vice  that  has 
not  skulked  behind  them.  It  is  only  yesterday  that 
our  American  churches,  so  long  silent  on  Slavery, 
and  notoriously  hostile  to  the  Abolitionist,  wheeled 
into  line  for  Emancipation. 

I  am  far  from  accepting  the  opinion  that  the  rev- 
elations of  the  moral  sentiment  are  insufficient,  as  if 
it  furnished  a  rule  only,  and  not  the  spirit  by  which 
the  rule  is  animated.     For  I  include  in  these,  of 


CHARACTER.  115 

course,  the  history  of  Jesus,  as  well  as  those  of 
every  divine  soul  which  in  any  place  or  time  deliv- 
ered any  grand  lesson  to  humanity ;  and  I  find  in 
the  eminent  experiences  in  all  times  a  substantial 
agreement.  The  sentiment  itself  teaches  unity  of 
source,  and  disowns  every  superiority  other  than  of 
deeper  truth.  Jesus  has  immense  claims  on  the  grat= 
itude  of  mankind,  and  knew  how  to  guard  the  in- 
tegrity of  his  brother's  soul  from  himself  also ;  but, 
in  his  disciples,  admiration  of  him  runs  away  with 
their  reverence  for  the  human  soul,  and  they  ham- 
per us  with  limitations  of  person  and  text.  Every 
exaggeration  of  these  is  a  violation  of  the  soul's 
right,  and  inclines  the  manly  reader  to  lay  down 
the  New  Testament,  to  take  up  the  Pagan  philoso- 
phers. It  is  not  that  the  Upanishads  or  the  Max- 
ims of  Antoninus  are  better,  but  that  they  do  not 
invade  his  freedom ;  because  they  are  only  sugges- 
tions, whilst  the  other  adds  the  inadmissible  claim 
of  positive  authority,  —  of  an  external  command, 
where  command  cannot  be.  This  is  the  secret  of 
the  mischievous  result  that,  in  every  period  of  in- 
tellectual expansion,  the  Church  ceases  to  draw 
into  its  clergy  those  who  best  belong  there,  the  lar- 
gest and  freest  minds,  and  that  in  its  most  liberal 
forms,  when  such  minds  enter  it,  they  are  coldly 
received,  and  find  themselves  out  of  place.  This 
charm  in  the  Pagan  moralists,  of  suggestion,  the 


116  CHARACTER. 

charm  of  poetry,  of  mere  truth,  (easily  disengaged 
from  their  historical  accidents  which  nobody  wishes 
to  force  on  us,)  the  New  Testament  loses  by  its 
connection  with  a  church.  Mankind  cannot  long 
suffer  this  loss,  and  the  office  of  this  age  is  to  put 
all  these  writings  on  the  eternal  footing  of  equality 
of  origin  in  the  instincts  of  the  human  mind.  It 
is  certain  that  each  inspired  master  will  gain  in- 
stantly by  the  separation  from  the  idolatry  of  ages. 
To  their  great  honor,  the  simple  and  free  minds 
among  our  clergy  have  not  resisted  the  voice  of 
Nature  and  the  advanced  perceptions  of  the  mind  ; 
and  every  church  divides  itself  into  a  liberal  and 
expectant  class,  on  one  side,  and  an  unwilling  and 
conservative  class  on  the  other.  As  it  stands  with 
us  now,  a  few  clergymen,  with  a  more  theological 
cast  of  mind,  retain  the  traditions,  but  they  carry 
them  quietly.  In  general  discourse,  they  are  never 
obtruded.  If  the  clergyman  should  travel  in  France, 
in  England,  in  Italy,  he  might  leave  them  locked 
up  in  the  same  closet  with  his  "  occasional  sermons" 
at  home,  and,  if  he  did  not  return,  would  never 
think  to  send  for  them.  The  orthodox  clergymen 
hold  a  little  firmer  to  theirs,  as  Calvinism  has  a 
more  tenacious  vitality;  but  that  is  doomed  also, 
and  will  only  die  last ;  for  Calvinism  rushes  to  be 
Unitarianism,  as  Unitarianism  rushes  to  be  pure 
Theism. 


CHARACTER.  117 

But  the  inspirations  are  never  withdrawn.  In 
the  worst  times,  men  of  organic  virtue  are  born,  — 
men  and  women  of  native  integrity,  and  indiffer- 
ently in  high  and  low  conditions.  There  will  al- 
ways be  a  class  of  imaginative  youths,  whom  poetry, 
whom  the  love  of  beauty,  lead  to  the  adoration  of 
the  moral  sentiment,  and  these  will  provide  it  with 
new  historic  forms  and  songs.  Religion  is  as  inex- 
pugnable as  the  use  of  lamps,  or  of  wells,  or  of 
chimneys.  We  must  have  days  and  temples  and 
teachers.  The  Sunday  is  the  core  of  our  civiliza- 
tion, dedicated  to  thought  and  reverence.  It  in- 
vites to  the  noblest  solitude  and  the  noblest  society, 
to  whatever  means  and  aids  of  spiritual  refresh- 
ment. Men  may  well  come  together  to  kindle  each 
other  to  virtuous  living.  Confucius  said,  "  If  in 
the  morning  I  hear  of  the  right  way,  and  in  the 
evening  die,  I  can  be  happy." 

The  churches  already  indicate  the  new  spirit  in 
adding  to  the  perennial  office  of  teaching,  benefi- 
cent activities,  —  as  in  creating  hospitals,  ragged 
schools,  offices  of  employment  for  the  poor,  appoint- 
ing almoners  to  the  helpless,  guardians  of  found- 
lings and  orphans.  The  power  that  in  other  times 
inspired  crusades,  or  the  colonization  of  New  Eng- 
land, or  the  modern  revivals,  flies  to  the  help  of  the 
deaf-mute  and  the  blind,  to  the  education  of  the 
sailor  and  the  vagabond  boy,  to  the  reform  of  con- 


118  CHARACTER. 

victs  and  harlots,  —  as  the  war  created  the  Hilton 
Head  and  Charleston  missions,  the  Sanitary  Com- 
mission, the  nurses  and  teachers  at  Washington. 

In  the  present  tendency  of  our  society,  in  the 
new  importance  of  the  individual,  when  thrones  are 
crumbling  and  presidents  and  governors  are  forced 
every  moment  to  remember  their  constituencies ; 
when  counties  and  towns  are  resisting  centraliza- 
tion, and  the  individual  voter  his  party,  —  society 
is  threatened  with  actual  granulation,  religious  as 
well  as  political.  How  many  people  are  there  in 
Boston  ?  Some  two  hundred  thousand.  Well, 
then  so  many  sects.  Of  course  each  poor  soul  loses 
all  his  old  stays ;  no  bishop  watches  him,  no  con- 
fessor reports  that  he  has  neglected  the  confessional, 
no  class-leader  admonishes  him  of  absences,  no 
fagot,  no  penance,  no  fine,  no  rebuke.  Is  not  this 
wrong  ?  is  not  this  dangerous  ?  'T  is  not  wrong, 
but  the  law  of  growth.  It  is  not  dangerous,  any 
more  than  the  mother's  withdrawing  her  hands 
from  the  tottering  babe,  at  his  first  walk  across  the 
nursery-floor  :  the  child  fears  and  cries,  but  achieves 
the  feat,  instantly  tries  it  again,  and  never  wishes 
to  be  assisted  more.  And  this  infant  soul  must 
learn  to  walk  alone.  At  first  he  is  forlorn,  home- 
less ;  but  this  rude  stripping  him  of  all  support 
drives  him  inward,  and  he  finds  himself  unhurt ;  he 


CHARACTER.  119 

finds  himself  face  to  face  with  the  majestic  Presence, 
reads  the  original  of  the  Ten  Commandments,  the 
original  of  Gospels  and  Epistles  ;  nay,  his  narrow 
chapel  expands  to  the  blue  cathedral  of  the  sky, 
where  he 

"  Looks  in  and  sees  each  blissful  deity, 
Where  he  before  the  thunderous  throne  doth  lie." 

To  nations  or  to  individuals  the  progress  of  opin- 
ion is  not  a  loss  of  moral  restraint,  but  simply  a 
change  from  coarser  to  finer  checks.  No  evil  can 
come  from  reform  which  a  deeper  thought  will  not 
correct.  If  there  is  any  tendency  in  national  ex- 
pansion to  form  character,  religion  will  not  be  a 
loser.  There  is  a  fear  that  pure  truth,  pure  morals, 
will  not  make  a  religion  for  the  affections.  When- 
ever the  sublimities  of  character  shall  be  incarnated 
in  a  man,  we  may  rely  that  awe  and  love  and  insa- 
tiable curiosity  will  follow  his  steps.  Character  is 
the  habit  of  action  from  the  permanent  vision  of 
truth.  It  carries  a  superiority  to  all  the  accidents 
of  life.  It  compels  right  relation  to  every  other 
man,  —  domesticates  itself  with  strangers  and  ene- 
mies. "  But  I,  father,"  says  the  wise  Prahlada,  in 
the  Yishnu  Purana,  "  know  neither  friends  nor  foes, 
for  I  behold  Kesava  in  all  beings  as  in  my  own 
soul."  It  confers  perpetual  insight.  It  sees  that 
a  man's  friends  and  his  foes  are  of  his  own  house- 
hold, of  his  own  person.     What  would  it  avail  me, 


120  CHARACTER. 

if  I  could  destroy  my  enemies  ?  There  would  be 
as  many  to-morrow.  That  which  I  hate  and  fear 
is  really  in  myself,  and  no  knife  is  long  enough  to 
reach  to  its  heart.  Confucius  said  one  day  to  Ke 
Kang  :  "  Sir,  in  carrying  on  your  government,  why 
should  you  use  killing  at  all?  Let  your  evinced 
desires  be  for  what  is  good,  and  the  people  will  be 
good.  The  grass  must  bend,  when  the  wind  blows 
across  it."  Ke  Kang,  distressed  about  the  number 
of  thieves  in  the  state,  inquired  of  Confucius  how 
to  do  away  with  them.  Confucius  said,  "  If  you, 
sir,  were  not  covetous,  although  you  should  reward 
them  to  do  it,  they  would  not  steal." 

Its  methods  are  subtle,  it  works  without  means. 
It  indulges  no  enmity  against  any,  knowing,  with 
Prahlada  that  "  the  suppression  of  malignant  feel- 
ing is  itself  a  reward."  The  more  reason,  the  less 
government.  In  a  sensible  family,  nobody  ever 
hears  the  words  "  shall  "  and  "  sha'n't ;  "  nobody 
commands,  and  nobody  obeys,  but  all  conspire  and 
joyfully  co-operate.  Take  off  the  roofs  of  hundreds 
of  happy  houses,  and  you  shall  see  this  order  with- 
out ruler,  and  the  like  in  every  intelligent  and  moral 
society.  Command  is  exceptional,  and  marks  some 
break  in  the  link  of  reason  ;  as  the  electricity  goes 
round  the  world  without  a  spark  or  a  sound,  until 
there  is  a  break  in  the  wire  or  the  water  chain. 
Swedenborg  said,  that,  "  in  the  spiritual  world,  when 


CHARACTER.  121 

one  wishes  to  rule,  or  despises  others,  he  is  thrust  out 
of  doors."  Goethe,  in  discussing  the  characters 
in  "  Wilhelm  Meister,"  maintained  his  belief  that 
"  pure  loveliness  and  right  good-will  are  the  highest 
manly  prerogatives,  before  which  all  energetic  hero- 
ism, with  its  lustre  and  renown,  must  recede."  In 
perfect  accord  with  this,  Henry  James  affirms,  that 
"to  give  the  feminine  element  in  life  its  hard- 
earned  but  eternal  supremacy  over  the  masculine 
has  been  the  secret  inspiration  of  all  past  history." 
There  is  no  end  to  the  sufficiency  of  character. 
It  can  afford  to  wait ;  it  can  do  without  what  is 
called  success  ;  it  cannot  but  succeed.  To  a  well- 
principled  man  existence  is  victory.  He  defends 
himself  against  failure  in  his  main  design  by  mak- 
ing every  inch  of  the  road  to  it  pleasant.  There  is 
no  trifle,  and  no  obscurity  to  him :  he  feels  the  im- 
mensity of  the  chain  whose  last  link  he  holds  in 
his  hand,  and  is  led  by  it.  Having  nothing,  this 
spirit  hath  all.  It  asks,  with  Marcus  Aurelius, 
"  What  matter  by  whom  the  good  is  done  ?  "  It 
extols  humility,  —  by  every  self-abasement  lifted 
higher  in  the  scale  of  being.  It  makes  no  stipula- 
tions for  earthly  felicity,  —  does  not  ask,  in  the  ab- 
soluteness of  its  trust,  even  for  the  assurance  of 
continued  life. 


EDUCATION. 


With  the  key  of  the  secret  he  marches  faster 
From  strength  to  strength,  and  for  night  brings  day. 
While  classes  or  tribes  too  weak  to  master 
The  flowing  conditions  of  life,  give  way. 


EDUCATION. 


A  new  degree  of  intellectual  power  seems  cheap 
at  any  price.  The  use  of  the  world  is  that  man 
may  learn  its  laws.  And  the  human  race  have 
wisely  signified  their  sense  of  this,  by  calling  wealth, 
means,  —  Man  being  the  end.  Language  is  always 
wise. 

Therefore  I  praise  New  England  because  it  is  the 
country  in  the  world  where  is  the  freest  expendi- 
ture for  education.  We  have  already  taken,  at  the 
planting  of  the  Colonies,  (for  aught  I  know  for  the 
first  time  in  the  world,)  the  initial  step,  which  for 
its  importance  might  have  been  resisted  as  the  most 
radical  of  revolutions,  thus  deciding  at  the  start  the 
destiny  of  this  country, —  this,  namely,  that  the  poor 
man,  whom  the  law  does  not  allow  to  take  an  ear 
of  corn  when  starving,  nor  a  pair  of  shoes  for  his 
freezing  feet,  is  allowed  to  put  his  hand  into  the 
pocket  of  the  rich,  and  say,  You  shall  educate  me, 
not  as  you  will,  but  as  I  will :  not  alone  in  the  ele- 
ments, but,  by  further  provision,  in  the  languages, 
in  sciences,  in  the  useful  and  in  elegant  arts.   The 


126  EDUCATION. 

child  shall  be  taken  up  by  the  State,  and  taught, 
at  the  public  cost,  the  rudiments  of  knowledge,  and, 
at  last,  the  ripest  results  of  art  and  science. 

Humanly  speaking,  the  school,  the  college,  so- 
ciety, make  the  difference  between  men.  All  the 
fairy  tales  of  Aladdin  or  the  invisible  Gyges  or 
the  talisman  that  opens  kings'  palaces  or  the  en- 
chanted halls  under-ground  or  in  the  sea,  are  only 
fictions  to  indicate  the  one  miracle  of  intellectual 
enlargement.  When  a  man  stupid  becomes  a  man 
inspired,  when  one  and  the  same  man  passes  out  of 
the  torpid  into  the  perceiving  state,  leaves  the  din 
of  trifles,  the  stupor  of  the  senses,  to  enter  into  the 
quasi-omniscience  of  high  thought,  —  up  and  down, 
around,  all  limits  disappear.  No  horizon  shuts 
down.  He  sees  things  in  their  causes,  all  facts  in 
their  connection. 

One  of  the  problems  of  history  is  the  beginning 
of  civilization.  The  animals  that  accompany  and 
serve  man  make  no  progress  as  races.  Those  called 
domestic  are  capable  of  learning  of  man  a  few 
tricks  of  utility  or  amusement,  but  they  cannot  com- 
municate the  skill  to  their  race.  Each  individual 
must  be  taught  anew.  The  trained  dog  cannot 
train  another  dog.  And  Man  himself  in  many 
races  retains  almost  the  unteachableness  of  the 
beast.  For  a  thousand  years  the  islands  and  for- 
ests of  a  great  part  of  the  world  have  been  filled 


EDUCATION.  127 

with  savages  who  made  no  steps  of  advance  in  art 
or  skill  beyond  the  necessity  of  being  fed  and 
warmed.  Certain  nations  with  a  better  brain  and 
usually  in  more  temperate  climates,  have  made  such 
progress  as  to  compare  with  these  as  these  compare 
with  the  bear  and  the  wolf. 

Victory  over  things  is  the  office  of  man.  Of 
course,  until  it  is  accomplished,  it  is  the  war  and  in- 
sult of  things  over  him.  His  continual  tendency, 
his  great  danger,  is  to  overlook  the  fact  that  the 
world  is  only  his  teacher,  and  the  nature  of  sun  and 
moon,  plant  and  animal  only  means  of  arousing 
his  interior  activity.  Enamored  of  their  beauty, 
comforted  by  their  convenience,  he  seeks  them  as 
ends,  and  fast  loses  sight  of  the  fact  that  they  have 
worse  than  no  values,  that  they  become  noxious, 
when  he  becomes  their  slave. 

This  apparatus  of  wants  and  faculties,  this  crav- 
ing body,  whose  organs  ask  all  the  elements  and  all 
the  functions  of  Nature  for  their  satisfaction,  edu- 
cate the  wondrous  creature  which  they  satisfy  with 
light,  with  heat,  with  water,  with  wood,  with  bread, 
with  wool.  The  necessities  imposed  by  this  most 
irritable  and  all-related  texture  have  taught  Man 
bunting,  pasturage,  agriculture,  commerce,  weaving, 
joining,  masonry,  geometry,  astronomy.  Here  is  a 
world  pierced  and  belted  with  natural  laws,  and 
fenced  and  planted  with  civil  partitions  and  proper- 


128  EDUCATION. 

ties,  which  all  put  new  restraints  on  the  young  in- 
habitant. He  too  must  come  into  this  magic  circle 
of  relations,  and  know  health  and  sickness,  the 
fear  of  injury,  the  desire  of  external  good,  the 
charm  of  riches,  the  charm  of  power.  The  house- 
hold is  a  school  of  power.  There,  within  the  door, 
learn  the  tragi-comedy  of  human  life.  Here  is  the 
sincere  thing,  the  wondrous  composition  for  which 
day  and  night  go  round.  In  that  routine  are  the 
sacred  relations,  the  passions  that  bind  and  sever. 
Here  is  poverty  and  all  the  wisdom  its  hated  neces- 
sities can  teach,  here  labor  drudges,  here  affections 
glow,  here  the  secrets  of  character  are  told,  the 
guards  of  man,  the  guards  of  woman,  the  compensa- 
tions which,  like  angels  of  justice,  pay  every  debt : 
the  opium  of  custom,  whereof  all  drink  and  many 
go  mad.  Here  is  Economy,  and  Glee,  and  Hospi- 
tality, and  Ceremony,  and  Frankness,  and  Calamity, 
and  Death,  and  Hope. 

Every  one  has  a  trust  of  power,  —  every  man, 
every  boy  a  jurisdiction,  whether  it  be  over  a  cow 
or  a  rood  of  a  potato-field,  or  a  fleet  of  ships,  or  the 
laws  of  a  state.  And  what  activity  the  desire  of 
power  inspires !  What  toils  it  sustains !  How  it 
sharpens  the  perceptions  and  stores  the  memory  with 
facts.  Thus  a  man  may  well  spend  many  years  of 
life  in  trade.  It  is  a  constant  teaching  of  the  laws 
of  matter  and  of  mind.     No  dollar  of  property  can 


EDUCATION.  129 

be  created  without  some  direct  communication  with 
nature,  and  of  course  some  acquisition  of  knowl- 
edge and  practical  force.  It  is  a  constant  contest 
with  the  active  faculties  of  men,  a  study  of  the  is- 
sues of  one  and  another  course  of  action,  an  accu- 
mulation of  power,  and,  if  the  higher  faculties  of 
the  individual  be  from  time  to  time  quickened,  he 
will  gain  wisdom  and  virtue  from  his  business. 

As  every  wind  draws  music  out  of  the  iEolian 
harp,  so  doth  every  object  in  Nature  draw  music 
out  of  his  mind.  Is  it  not  true  that  every  landscape 
I  behold,  every  friend  I  meet,  every  act  I  perform, 
every  pain  I  suffer,  leaves  me  a  different  being 
from  that  they  found  me  ?  That  poverty,  love,  au- 
thority, anger,  sickness,  sorrow,  success,  all  work 
actively  upon  our  being  and  unlock  for  us  the  con- 
cealed faculties  of  the  mind  ?  Whatever  private 
or  petty  ends  are  frustrated,  this  end  is  always  an- 
swered. Whatever  the  man  does,  or  whatever  be- 
falls him,  opens  another  chamber  in  his  soul,  — 
that  is,  he  has  got  a  new  feeling,  a  new  thought,  a 
new  organ.  Do  we  not  see  how  amazingly  for  this 
end  man  is  fitted  to  the  world  ? 

What  leads  him  to  science  ?  Why  does  he  track 
in  the  midnight  heaven  a  pure  spark,  a  luminous 
patch  wandering  from  age  to  age,  but  because  he 
acquires  thereby  a  majestic  sense  of  power  ;  learn- 
ing that  in  his  own  constitution  he  can  set  the  shin- 


130  EDUCATION. 

ing  maze  in  order,  and  finding  and  carrying  their 
law  in  his  mind,  can,  as  it  were,  see  his  simple 
idea  realized  up  yonder  in  giddy  distances  and 
frightful  periods  of  duration.  If  Newton  come 
and  first  of  men  perceive  that  not  alone  certain 
bodies  fall  to  the  ground  at  a  certain  rate,  but  that 
all  bodies  in  the  Universe,  the  universe  of  bodies, 
fall  always,  and  at  one  rate ;  that  every  atom  in 
nature  draws  to  every  other  atom,  —  he  extends 
the  power  of  his  mind  not  only  over  every  cubic 
atom  of  his  native  planet,  but  he  reports  the  condi- 
tion of  millions  of  worlds  which  his  eye  never  saw. 
And  what  is  the  charm  which  every  ore,  every  new 
plant,  every  new  fact  touching  winds,  clouds,  ocean 
currents,  the  secrets  of  chemical  composition  and 
decomposition  possess  for  Humboldt  ?  What  but 
that  much  revolving  of  similar  facts  in  his  mind 
has  shown  him  that  always  the  mind  contains  in 
its  transparent  chambers  the  means  of  classifying 
the  most  refractory  phenomena,  of  depriving  them 
of  all  casual  and  chaotic  aspect,  and  subordinating 
them  to  a  bright  reason  of  its  own,  and  so  giving 
to  man  a  sort  of  property,  —  yea,  the  very  highest 
property  in  every  district  and  particle  of  the  globe. 
■  By  the  permanence  of  Nature,  minds  are  trained 
alike,  and  made  intelligible  to  each  other.  In  our 
condition  are  the  roots  of  language  and  communi- 
cation, and  these  instructions  we  never  exhaust. 


EDUCATION.  131 

In  some  sort  the  end  of  life  is  that  the  man 
should  take  up  the  universe  into  himself,  or  out  of 
that  quarry  leave  nothing  unrepresented.  Yonder 
mountain  must  migrate  into  his  mind.  Yonder 
magnificent  astronomy  he  is  at  last  to  import,  fetch- 
ing away  moon,  and  planet,  solstice,  period,  comet 
and  binal  star,  by  comprehending  their  relation  and 
law.  Instead  of  the  timid  stripling  he  was,  he  is 
to  be  the  stalwart  Archimedes,  Pythagoras,  Colum- 
bus, Newton,  of  the  physic,  metaphysic  and  ethics 
of  the  design  of  the  world. 

For  truly  the  population  of  the  globe  has  its 
origin  in  the  aims  which  their  existence  is  to  serve ; 
and  so  with  every  portion  of  them.  The  truth 
takes  flesh  in  forms  that  can  express  it ;  and  thus 
in  history  an  idea  always  overhangs,  like  the  moon, 
and  rules  the  tide  which  rises  simultaneously  in  all 
the  souls  of  a  generation. 

Whilst  thus  the  world  exists  for  the  mind; 
whilst  thus  the  man  is  ever  invited  inward  into 
shining  realms  of  knowledge  and  power  by  the 
shows  of  the  world,  which  interpret  to  him  the  in- 
finitude of  his  own  consciousness,  —  it  becomes  the 
office  of  a  just  education  to  awaken  him  to  the 
knowledge  of  this  fact. 

We  learn  nothing  rightly  until  we  learn  the  sym- 
bolical character  of  life.  Day  creeps  after  day, 
each  full   of  facts,  dull,   strange,  despised  things, 


132  EDUCATION. 

that  we  cannot  enough  despise,  —  call  heavy,  pro- 
saic, and  desert.  The  time  we  seek  to  kill :  the 
attention  it  is  elegant  to  divert  from  things  around 
us.  And  presently  the  aroused  intellect  finds  gold 
and  gems  in  one  of  these  scorned  facts,  —  then  finds 
that  the  day  of  facts  is  a  rock  of  diamonds ;  that  a 
fact  is  an  Epiphany  of  God. 

We  have  our  theory  of  life,  our  religion,  our 
philosophy;  and  the  event  of  each  moment,  the 
shower,  the  steamboat  disaster,  the  passing  of  a 
beautiful  face,  the  apoplexy  of  our  neighbor,  are 
all  tests  to  try  our  theory,  the  approximate  result 
we  call  truth,  and  reveal  its  defects.  If  I  have  re- 
nounced the  search  of  truth,  if  I  have  come  into 
the  port  of  some  pretending  dogmatism,  some  new 
church  or  old  church,  some  Schelling  or  Cousin,  I 
have  died  to  all  use  of  these  new  events  that  are 
born  out  of  prolific  time  into  multitude  of  life  every 
hour.  I  am  as  a  bankrupt  to  whom  brilliant  oppor- 
tunities offer  in  vain.  He  has  just  foreclosed  his 
freedom,  tied  his  hands,  locked  himself  up  and 
given  the  key  to  another  to  keep. 

When  I  see  the  doors  by  which  God  enters  into 
the  mind;  that  there  is  no  sot  or  fop,  ruffian  or 
pedant  into  whom  thoughts  do  not  enter  by  pas- 
sages which  the  individual  never  left  open,  I  can 
expect  any  revolution  in  character.  "  I  have  hope," 
said  the  great  Leibnitz,  "  that  society  may  be  re* 


EDUCATION.  133 

formed,  when  I  see  how  much  education  may  be 
reformed." 

It  is  ominous,  a  presumption  of  crime,  that  this 
word  Education  has  so  cold,  so  hopeless  a  sound. 
A  treatise  on  education,  a  convention  for  educa- 
tion, a  lecture,  a  system,  affects  us  with  slight  pa- 
ralysis and  a  certain  yawning  of  the  jaws.  We 
are  not  encouraged  when  the  law  touches  it  with 
its  fingers.  Education  should  be  as  broad  as  man. 
Whatever  elements  are  in  him  that  should  foster 
and  demonstrate.  If  he  be  dexterous,  his  tuition 
should  make  it  appear ;  if  he  be  capable  of  divid- 
ing men  by  the  trenchant  sword  of  his  thought, 
education  should  unsheathe  and  sharpen  it ;  if  he 
is  one  to  cement  society  by  his  all-reconciling  affin- 
ities, oh !  hasten  their  action  !  If  he  is  jovial,  if 
he  is  mercurial,  if  he  is  great-hearted,  a  cunning 
artificer,  a  strong  commander,  a  potent  ally,  ingen- 
ious, useful,  elegant,  witty,  prophet,  diviner,  —  so- 
ciety has  need  of  all  these.  The  imagination  must 
be  addressed.  Why  always  coast  on  the  surface 
and  never  open  the  interior  of  nature,  not  by  sci- 
ence, which  is  surface  still,  but  by  poetry  ?  Is  not 
the  Vast  an  element  of  the  mind  ?  Yet  what  teach- 
ing, what  book  of  this  day  appeals  to  the  Vast  ? 

Our  culture  has  truckled  to  the  times,  —  to  the 
senses.  It  is  not  manworthy.  If  the  vast  and  the 
spiritual  are  omitted,  so  are  the  practical  and  the 


134  EDUCATION. 

moral.  It  does  not  make  us  brave  or  free.  We 
teach  boys  to  be  such  men  as  we  are.  We  do  not 
teach  them  to  aspire  to  be  all  they  can.  Wre  do 
not  give  them  a  training  as  if  we  believed  in  their 
noble  nature.  We  scarce  educate  their  bodies. 
We  do  not  train  the  eye  and  the  hand.  We  exer- 
cise their  understandings  to  the  apprehension  and 
comparison  of  some  facts,  to  a  skill  in  numbers,  in 
words  ;  we  aim  to  make  accountants,  attorneys, 
engineers  ;  but  not  to  make  able,  earnest,  great- 
hearted men.  The  great  object  of  Education  should 
be  commensurate  with  the  object  of  life.  It  should 
be  a  moral  one ;  to  teach  self -trust :  to  inspire  the 
youthful  man  with  an  interest  in  himself ;  with  a 
curiosity  touching  his  own  nature  ;  to  acquaint  him 
with  the  resources  of  his  mind,  and  to  teach  him 
that  there  is  all  his  strength,  and  to  inflame  him 
with  a  piety  towards  the  Grand  Mind  in  which  he 
lives.  Thus  would  education  conspire  with  the  Di- 
vine Providence.  A  man  is  a  little  thing  whilst  he 
works  by  and  for  himself,  but,  when  he  gives  voice 
to  the  rules  of  love  and  justice,  is  godlike,  his  word 
is  current  in  all  countries ;  and  all  men,  though  his 
enemies,  are  made  his  friends  and  obey  it  as  their 
own. 

In  affirming  that  the  moral  nature  of  man  is 
the  predominant  element  and  should  therefore  be 
mainly  consulted  in  the  arrangements  of  a  school, 


EDUCATION.  135 

I  am  very  far  from  wishing  that  it  should  swallow 
up  all  the  other  instincts  and  faculties  of  man.  It 
should  be  enthroned  in  his  mind,  but  if  it  monopo- 
lize the  man  he  is  not  yet  sound,  he  does  not  yet 
know  his  wealth.  He  is  in  danger  of  becoming 
merely  devout,  and  wearisome  through  the  monot- 
ony of  his  thought.  It  is  not  less  necessary  that  the 
intellectual  and  the  active  faculties  should  be  nour- 
ished and  matured.  Let  us  apply  to  this  subject 
the  light  of  the  same  torch  by  which  we  have  looked 
at  all  the  phenomena  of  the  time  ;  the  infinitude, 
namely,  of  every  man.     Everything  teaches  that. 

One  fact  constitutes  all  my  satisfaction,  inspires 
all  my  trust,  viz.,  this  perpetual  youth,  which,  as 
long  as  there  is  any  good  in  us,  we  cannot  get  rid 
of.  It  is  very  certain  that  the  coming  age  and 
the  departing  age  seldom  understand  each  other. 
The  old  man  thinks  the  young  man  has  no  distinct 
purpose,  for  he  could  never  get  anything  intelli  ■ 
gible  and  earnest  out  of  him.  Perhaps  the  young 
man  does  not  think  it  worth  his  while  to  explain 
himself  to  so  hard  and  inapprehensive  a  confessor* 
Let  him  be  led  up  with  a  long-sighted  forbearance, 
and  let  not  the  sallies  of  his  petulance  or  folly  be 
checked  with  disgust  or  indignation  or  despair. 

I  call  our  system  a  system  of  despair,  and  I  find 
all  the  correction,  all  the  revolution  that  is  needed 
and  that  the  best  spirits  of  this   age  promise,  in 


136  EDUCATION. 

one  word,  in  Hope.  Nature,  when  she  sends  a  new 
mind  into  the  world,  fills  it  beforehand  with  a  de- 
sire for  that  which  she  wishes  it  to  know  and  do. 
Let  ns  wait  and  see  what  is  this  new  creation,  of 
what  new  organ  the  great  Spirit  had  need  when  it 
incarnated  this  new  Will.  A  new  Adam  in  the 
garden,  he  is  to  name  all  the  beasts  in  the  field,  all 
the  gods  in  the  sky.  And  jealous  provision  seems 
to  have  been  made  in  his  constitution  that  you 
shall  not  invade  and  contaminate  him  with  the 
worn  weeds  of  your  language  and  opinions.  The 
charm  of  li£3  is  this  variety  of  genius,  these  con- 
trasts and  flavors  by  which  Heaven  has  modulated 
the  identity  of  truth,  and  there  is  a  perpetual  hank- 
ering to  violate  this  individuality,  to  warp  his  ways 
of  thinking  and  behavior  to  resemble  or  reflect 
your  thinking  and  behavior.  A  low  self-love  in 
the  parent  desires  that  his  child  should  repeat  his 
character  and  fortune  ;  an  expectation  which  the 
child,  if  justice  is  done  him,  will  nobly  disappoint. 
By  working  on  the  theory  that  this  resemblance  ex- 
ists, we  shall  do  what  in  us  lies  to  defeat  his  proper 
promise  and  produce  the  ordinary  and  mediocre.  I 
suffer  whenever  I  see  that  common  sight  of  a  parent 
or  senior  imposing  his  opinion  and  way  of  think- 
ing and  being  on  a  young  soul  to  which  they  are 
totally  unfit.  Cannot  we  let  people  be  themselves, 
and  enjoy  life  in  their  own  way  ?  You  are  trying 
to  make  that  man  another  you.     One 's  enough. 


EDUCATION.  137 

Or  we  sacrifice  the  genius  of  the  pupil,  the  un- 
known possibilities  of  his  nature,  to  a  neat  and  safe 
uniformity,  as  the  Turks  whitewash  the  costly  mo- 
saics of  ancient  art  which  the  Greeks  left  on  their 
temple  walls.  Kather  let  us  have  men  whose  man- 
hood is  only  the  continuation  of  their  boyhood,  nat- 
ural characters  still;  such  are  able  and  fertile  for 
heroic  action ;  and  not  that  sad  spectacle  with  which 
we  are  too  familiar,  educated  eyes  in  uneducated 
bodies. 

I  like  boys,  the  masters  of  the  playground  and 
of  the  street,  —  boys,  who  have  the  same  liberal 
ticket  of  admission  to  all  shops,  factories,  armories, 
town-meetings,  caucuses,  mobs,  target-shootings,  as 
flies  have  ;  quite  unsuspected,  coming  in  as  natu- 
rally as  the  janitor,  —  known  to  have  no  money  in 
their  pockets,  and  themselves  not  suspecting  the 
value  of  this  poverty ;  putting  nobody  on  his  guard, 
but  seeing  the  inside  of  the  show,  —  hearing  all  the 
asides.  There  are  no  secrets  from  them,  they 
know  everything  that  befalls  in  the  fire-company, 
the  merits  of  every  engine  and  of  every  man  at  the 
brakes,  how  to  work  it,  and  are  swift  to  try  their 
hand  at  every  part ;  so  too  the  merits  of  every  lo- 
comotive on  the  rails,  and  will  coax  the  engineer  to 
let  them  ride  with  him  and  pull  the  handles  when 
it  goes  to  the  engine-house.  They  are  there  only 
for  fun,  and  not  knowing  that  they  are  at  school, 


138  EDUCATION.- 

in  the  court-house,  or  the  cattle-show,  quite  as  much 
and  more  than  they  were,  an  hour  ago,  in  the  arith- 
metic class. 

They  know  truth  from  counterfeit  as  quick  as 
the  chemist  does.  They  detect  weakness  in  your 
eye  and  behavior  a  week  before  you  open  your 
mouth,  and  have  given  you  the  benefit  of  their  opin- 
ion quick  as  a  wink.  They  make  no  mistakes,  have 
no  pedantry,  but  entire  belief  on  experience.  Their 
elections  at  base -ball  or  cricket  are  founded  on 
merit,  and  are  right.  They  don't  pass  for  swim- 
mers until  they  can  swim,  nor  for  stroke-oar  until 
they  can  row :  and  I  desire  to  be  saved  from  their 
contempt.  If  I  can  pass  with  them,  I  can  manage 
well  enough  with  their  fathers. 

Everybody  delights  in  the  energy  with  which  boys 
deal  and  talk  with  each  other  ;  the  mixture  of  fun 
and  earnest,  reproach  and  coaxing,  love  and  wrath, 
with  which  the  game  is  played  ;  —  the  good-natured 
yet  defiant  independence  of  a  leading  boy's  behav- 
ior in  the  school-yard.  How  we  envy  in  later  life 
the  happy  youths  to  whom  their  boisterous  games 
and  rough  exercise  furnish  the  precise  element 
which  frames  and  sets  off  their  school  and  college 
tasks,  and  teaches  them,  when  least  they  think  it, 
the  use  and  meaning  of  these.  In  their  fun  and 
extreme  freak  they  hit  on  the  topmost  sense  of  Hor- 
ace.    The  young  giant,  brown  from  his  hunting- 


EDUCATION.  139 

tramp,  tells  his  story  well,  interlarded  with  lucky- 
allusions  to  Homer,  to  Yirgil,  to  college-songs,  to 
Walter  Scott ;  and  Jove  and  Achilles,  partridge 
and  trout,  opera  and  binomial  theorem,  Caesar  in 
Gaul,  Sherman  in  Savannah,  and  hazing  in  Hol- 
worthy,  dance  through  the  narrative  in  merry  con- 
fusion, yet  the  logic  is  good.  If  he  can  turn  his 
books  to  such  picturesque  account  in  his  fishing  and 
hunting,  it  is  easy  to  see  how  his  reading  and  expe- 
rience, as  he  has  more  of  both,  will  interpenetrate 
each  other.  And  every  one  desires  that  this  pure 
vigor  of  action  and  wealth  of  narrative,  cheered 
with  so  much  humor  and  street  rhetoric,  should  be 
carried  into  the  habit  of  the  young  man,  purged  of 
its  uproar  and  rudeness,  but  with  all  its  vivacity  en- 
tire. His  hunting  and  campings-out  have  given 
him  an  indispensable  base :  I  wish  to  add  a  taste 
for  good  company  through  his  impatience  of  bad. 
That  stormy  genius  of  his  needs  a  little  direction  to 
games,  charades,  verses  of  society,  song,  and  a  cor- 
respondence year  by  year  with  his  wisest  and  best 
friends.  Friendship  is  an  order  of  nobility ;  from 
its  revelations  we  come  more  worthily  into  nature. 
Society  he  must  have  or  he  is  poor  indeed ;  he 
gladly  enters  a  school  which  forbids  conceit,  affec- 
tation, emphasis  and  dulness,  and  requires  of  each 
only  the  flower  of  his  nature  and  experience ;  re- 
quires good-will,  beauty,  wit,  and  select  informa- 


140  EDUCATION. 

tion ;  teaches  by  practice  the  law  of  conversation, 
namely,  to  hear  as  well  as  to  speak. 

Meantime,  if  circumstances  do  not  permit  the 
high  social  advantages,  solitude  has  also  its  lessons. 
The  obscure  youth  learns  there  the  practice  instead 
of  the  literature  of  his  virtues ;  and,  because  of  the 
disturbing  effect  of  passion  and  sense,  which  by 
a  multitude  of  trifles  impede  the  mind's  eye  from 
the  quiet  search  of  that  fine  horizon-line  which  truth 
keeps,  —  the  way  to  knowledge  and  power  has  ever 
been  an  escape  from  too  much  engagement  with 
affairs  and  possessions  ;  a  way,  not  through  plenty 
and  superfluity,  but  by  denial  and  renunciation, 
into  solitude  and  privation  ;  and,  the  more  is  taken 
away,  the  more  real  and  inevitable  wealth  of  be- 
ing is  made  known  to  us.  The  solitary  knows  the 
essence  of  the  thought,  the  scholar  in  society  only 
its  fair  face.  There  is  no  want  of  example  of  great 
men,  great  benefactors,  who  have  been  monks  and 
hermits  in  habit.  The  bias  of  mind  is  sometimes 
irresistible  in  that  direction.  The  man  is,  as  it  were, 
born  deaf  and  dumb,  and  dedicated  to  a  narrow  and 
lonely  life.  Let  him  study  the  art  of  solitude,  yield 
as  gracefully  as  he  can  to  his  destiny.  Why  can- 
not he  get  the  good  of  his  doom,  and  if  it  is  from 
eternity  a  settled  fact  that  he  and  society  shall  be 
nothing  to  ea*ch  other,  why  need  he  blush  so,  and 
make  wry  faces  to  keep  up  a  freshman's  seat  in  the 


EDUCATION.  141 

fine  world?  Heaven  often  protects  valuable  souls 
charged  with  great  secrets,  great  ideas,  by  long 
shutting  them  up  with  their  own  thoughts.  And 
the  most  genial  and  amiable  of  men  must  alternate 
society  with  solitude,  and  learn  its  severe  lessons. 

There  comes  the  period  of  the  imagination  to 
each,  a  later  youth  ;  the  power  of  beauty,  the  power 
of  books,  of  poetry.  Culture  makes  his  books  real- 
ities to  him,  their  characters  more  brilliant,  more 
effective  on  his  mind,  than  his  actual  mates.  Do 
not  spare  to  put  novels  into  the  hands  of  young  peo- 
ple as  an  occasional  holiday  and  experiment ;  but, 
above  all,  good  poetry  in  all  kinds,  epic,  tragedy, 
lyric.  If  we  can  touch  the  imagination,  we  serve 
them,  they  will  never  forget  it.  Let  him  read 
"Tom  Brown  at  Rugby,"  read  "Tom  Brown  at 
Oxford," —  better  yet,  read  "  Hodson's  Life  "  — 
Hodson  who  took  prisoner  the  king  of  Delhi.  They 
teach  the  same  truth,  —  a  trust,  against  all  appear- 
ances, against  all  privations,  in  your  own  worth,  and 
not  in  tricks,  plotting,  or  patronage. 

I  believe  that  our  own  experience  instructs  us 
that  the  secret  of  Education  lies  in  respecting  the 
pupil.  It  is  not  for  you  to  choose  what  he  shall 
know,  what  he  shall  do.  It  is  chosen  and  foreor- 
dained, and  he  only  holds  the  key  to  his  own  secret. 
By  your  tampering  and  thwarting  and  too  much 


142  EDUCATION. 

governing  lie  may  be  hindered  from  his  end  and 
kept  out  of  his  own.  Respect  the  child.  Wait 
and  see  the  new  product  of  Nature.  Nature  loves 
analogies,  but  not  repetitions.  Respect  the  child. 
Be  not  too  much  his  parent.  Trespass  not  on  his 
solitude. 

But  I  hear  the  outcry  which  replies  to  this  sug- 
gestion :  —  Would  you  verily  throw  up  the  reins  of 
public  and  private  discipline  ;  would  you  leave  the 
young  child  to  the  mad  career  of  his  own  passions 
and  whimsies,  and  call  this  anarchy  a  respect  for 
the  child's  nature  ?  I  answer,  —  Respect  the  child, 
respect  him  to  the  end,  but  also  respect  yourself. 
Be  the  companion  of  his  thought,  the  friend  of  his 
friendship,  the  lover  of  his  virtue,  —  but  no  kins- 
man of  his  sin.  Let  him  find  you  so  true  to  your- 
self that  you  are  the  irreconcilable  hater  of  his 
vice  and  the  imperturbable  slighter  of  his  trifling. 

The  two  points  in  a  boy's  training  are,  to  keep 
his  naturel  and  train  off  all  but  that :  —  to  keep 
his  naturel,  but  stop  off  his  uproar,  fooling  and 
horse-play;  —  keep  his  nature  and  arm  it  with 
knowledge  in  the  very  direction  in  which  it  points. 
Here  are  the  two  capital  facts,  Genius  and  Drill, 
The  first  is  the  inspiration  in  the  well-born  healthy 
child,  the  new  perception  he  has  of  nature.  Some- 
what he  sees  in  forms  or  hears  in  music  or  appre- 
hends in   mathematics,  or  believes  practicable   m 


EDUCATION.  143 

mechanics  or  possible  in  political  society,  which  no 
one  else  sees  or  hears  or  believes.  This  is  the  per- 
petual romance  of  new  life,  the  invasion  of  God 
into  the  old  dead  world,  when  he  sends  into  quiet 
houses  a  young  soul  with  a  thought  which  is  not 
met,  looking  for  something  which  is  not  there,  but 
which  ought  to  be  there :  the  thought  is  dim  but  it 
is  sure,  and  he  casts  about  restless  for  means  and 
masters  to  verify  it ;  he  makes  wild  attempts  to  ex- 
plain himself  and  invoke  the  aid  and  consent  of 
the  bystanders.  Baffled  for  want  of  language  and 
methods  to  convey  his  meaning,  not  yet  clear  to 
himself,  he  conceives  that  though  not  in  this  house 
or  town,  yet  in  some  other  house  or  town  is  the  wise 
master  who  can  put  him  in  possession  of  the  rules 
and  instruments  to  execute  his  will.  Happy  this 
child  with  a  bias,  with  a  thought  which  entrances 
him,  leads  him,  now  into  deserts  now  into  cities, 
the  fool  of  an  idea.  Let  him  follow  it  in  good 
and  in  evil  report,  in  good  or  bad  company ;  it  will 
justify  itself  ;  it  will  lead  him  at  last  into  the  illustri- 
ous society  of  the  lovers  of  truth. 

In  London,  in  a  private  company,  I  became  ac- 
quainted with  a  gentleman,  Sir  Charles  Fellowes, 
who,  being  at  Xanthus,  in  the  ^Egean  Sea,  had  seen 
a  Turk  point  with  his  staff  to  some  carved  work 
on  the  corner  of  a  stone  almost  buried  in  the  soil. 
Fellowes  scraped   away  the  dirt,  was  struck  with 


144  EDUCATION. 

the  beauty  of  the  sculptured  ornaments,  and,  look- 
ing about  him,  observed  more  blocks  and  fragments 
like  this.  He  returned  to  the  spot,  procured  labor- 
ers and  uncovered  many  blocks.  He  went  back  to 
England,  bought  a  Greek  grammar  and  learned 
the  language ;  he  read  history  and  studied  ancient 
art  to  explain  his  stones ;  he  interested  Gibson  the 
sculptor  ;  he  invoked  the  assistance  of  the  English 
Government ;  he  called  in  the  succor  of  Sir  Hum- 
phry Davy  to  analyze  the  pigments ;  of  experts  in 
coins,  of  scholars  and  connoisseurs ;  and  at  last  in 
his  third  visit  brought  home  to  England  such  stat- 
ues and  marble  reliefs  and  such  careful  plans  that 
he  was  able  to  reconstruct,  in  the  British  Museum 
where  it  now  stands,  the  perfect  model  of  the  Ionic 
trophy-monument,  fifty  years  older  than  the  Parthe- 
non of  Athens,  and  which  had  been  destroyed  by 
earthquakes,  then  by  iconoclast  Christians,  then  by 
savage  Turks.  But  mark  that  in  the  task  he  had 
achieved  an  excellent  education,  and  become  asso- 
ciated with  distinguished  scholars  whom  he  had 
interested  in  his  pursuit;  in  short,  had  formed  a 
college  for  himself ;  the  enthusiast  had  found  the 
master,  the  masters,  whom  he  sought.  Always 
genius  seeks  genius,  desires  nothing  so  much  as  to 
be  a  pupil  and  to  find  those  who  can  lend  it  aid  to 
perfect  itself. 

Nor  are  the  two  elements,  enthusiasm  and  drill. 


EDUCATION.  145 

incompatible.  Accuracy  is  essential  to  beauty.  The 
very  definition  of  the  intellect  is  Aristotle's  :  "  that 
by  which  we  know  terms  or  boundaries."  Give  a 
boy  accurate  perceptions.  Teach  him  the  difference 
between  the  similar  and  the  same.  Make  him  call 
things  by  their  right  names.  Pardon  in  him  no 
blunder.  Then  he  will  give  you  solid  satisfaction 
as  long  as  he  lives.  It  is  better  to  teach  the  child 
arithmetic  and  Latin  grammar  than  rhetoric  or 
moral  philosophy,  because  they  require  exactitude 
of  performance ;  it  is  made  certain  that  the  lesson 
is  mastered,  and  that  power  of  performance  is  worth 
more  than  the  knowledge.  He  can  learn  anything 
which  is  important  to  him  now  that  the  power  to 
learn  is  secured :  as  mechanics  say,  when  one  has 
learned  the  use  of  tools,  it  is  easy  to  work  at  a  new 
craft. 

Letter  by  letter,  syllable  by  syllable,  the  child 
learns  to  read,  and  in  good  time  can  convey  to  all 
the  domestic  circle  the  sense  of  Shakspeare.  By 
many  steps  each  just  as  short,  the  stammering  boy 
and  the  hesitating  collegian,  in  the  school  debate, 
in  college  clubs,  in  mock  court,  comes  at  last  to  full, 
secure,  triumphant  unfolding  of  his  thought  in  the 
popular  assembly,  with  a  fullness  of  power  that 
makes  all  the  steps  forgotten. 

But  this  function  of  opening  and  feeding  the  hu- 
man mind  is  not  to  be  fulfilled  by  any  mechanical 

VOL.  XL.  10 


146  EDUCATION. 

or  military  method ;  is  not  to  be  trusted  to  any  skill 
less  large  than  Nature  itself.  You  must  not  neg- 
lect the  form,  but  you  must  secure  the  essentials. 
It  is  curious  how  perverse  and  intermeddling  we 
are,  and  what  vast  pains  and  cost  we  incur  to  do 
wrong.  Whilst  we  all  know  in  our  own  experi- 
ence and  apply  natural  methods  in  our  own  busi- 
ness,—  in  education  our  common  sense  fails  us, 
and  we  are  continually  trying  costly  machinery 
against  nature,  in  patent  schools  and  academies 
and  in  great  colleges  and  universities. 

The  natural  method  forever  confutes  our  experi- 
ments, and  we  must  still  come  back  to  it.  The 
whole  theory  of  the  school  is  on  the  nurse's  or 
mother's  knee.  The  child  is  as  hot  to  learn  as 
the  mother  is  to  impart.  There  is  mutual  delight. 
The  joy  of  our  childhood  in  hearing  beautiful  sto- 
ries from  some .  skilful  aunt  who  loves  to  tell  them, 
must  be  repeated  in  youth.  The  boy  wishes  to 
learn  to  skate,  to  coast,  to  catch  a  fish  in  the  brook, 
to  hit  a  mark  with  a  snowball  or  a  stone  ;  and  a  boy 
a  little  older  is  just  as  well  pleased  to  teach  him 
these  sciences.  Not  less  delightful  is  the  mutual 
pleasure  of  teaching  and  learning  the  secret  of  al- 
gebra, or  of  chemistry,  or  of  good  reading  and  good 
recitation  of  poetry  or  of  prose,  or  of  chosen  facts 
in  history  or  in  biography. 

Nature    provided    for    the    communication    of 


EDUCATION.  147 

thought,  by  planting  with  it  in  the  receiving  mind 
a  fury  to  impart  it.  'T  is  so  in  every  art,  in  every 
science.  One  burns  to  tell  the  new  fact,  the  other 
burns  to  hear  it.  See  how  far  a  young  doctor  will 
ride  or  walk  to  witness  a  new  surgical  operation.  I 
have  seen  a  carriage-maker's  shop  emptied  of  all  its 
workmen  into  the  street,  to  scrutinize  a  new  pattern 
from  New  York.  So  in  literature,  the  young  man 
who  has  taste  for  poetry,  for  fine  images,  for  noble 
thoughts,  is  insatiable  for  this  nourishment,  and  for- 
gets all  the  world  for  the  more  learned  friend,  — 
who  finds  equal  joy  in  dealing  out  his  treasures. 

Happy  the  natural  college  thus  self -instituted 
around  every  natural  teacher ;  the  young  men  of 
Athens  around  Socrates;  of  Alexandria  around 
Plotinus ;  of  Paris  around  Abelard ;  of  Germany 
around  Fichte,  or  Niebuhr,  or  Goethe :  in  short  the 
natural  sphere  of  every  leading  mind.  But  the 
moment  this  is  organized,  difficulties  begin.  The 
college  was  to  be  the  nurse  and  home  of  genius ; 
but,  though  every  young  man  is  born  with  some  de- 
termination in  his  nature,  and  is  a  potential  genius; 
is  at  last  to  be  one  ;  it  is,  in  the  most,  obstructed 
and  delayed,  and,  whatever  they  may  hereafter  be, 
their  senses  are  now  opened  in  advance  of  their 
minds.  They  are  more  sensual  than  intellectual. 
Appetite  and  indolence  they  have,  but  no  enthusi- 
asm.    These  come  in  numbers  to  the  college  :  few 


148  EDUCATION. 

geniuses :  and  the  teaching  comes  to  be  arranged 
for  these  many,  and  not  for  those  few.  Hence  the 
instruction  seems  to  require  skilful  tutors,  of  accu- 
rate and  systematic  mind,  rather  than  ardent  and 
inventive  masters.  Besides,  the  youth  of  genius 
are  eccentric,  won't  drill,  are  irritable,  uncertain, 
explosive,  solitary,  not  men  of  the  world,  not  good 
for  every-day  association.  You  have  to  work  for 
large  classes  instead  of  individuals ;  you  must  lower 
your  flag  and  reef  your  sails  to  wait  for  the  dull 
sailors ;  you  grow  departmental,  routinary,  military 
almost  with  your  discipline  and  college  police.  But 
what  doth  such  a  school  to  form  a  great  and  heroic 
character?  What  abiding  Hope  can  it  inspire? 
What  Reformer  will  it  nurse  ?  What  poet  will  it 
breed  to  sing  to  the  human  race  ?  What  discov- 
erer of  Nature's  laws  will  it  prompt  to  enrich  us  by 
disclosing  in  the.  mind  the  statute  which  all  matter 
must  obey?  What  fiery  soul  will  it  send  out  to 
warm  a  nation  with  his  charity  ?  What  tranquil 
mind  will  it  have  fortified  to  walk  with  meekness 
in  private  and  obscure  duties,  to  wait  and  to  suffer? 
Is  it  not  manifest  that  our  academic  institutions 
should  have  a  wider  scope  ;  that  they  should  not  be 
timid  and  keep  the  ruts  of  the  last  generation,  but 
that  wise  men  thinking  for  themselves  and  heartily 
seeking  the  good  of  mankind,  and  counting  the  cost 
of  innovation,  should  dare  to  arouse  the  young  to  a 


EDUCATION.  149 

just  and  heroic  life ;  that  the  moral  nature  should  be 
addressed  in  the  school-room,  and  children  should 
be  treated  as  the  high-born  candidates  of  truth  and 
virtue  ? 

So  to  regard  the  young  child,  the  young  man, 
requires,  no  doubt,  rare  patience  :  a  patience  that 
nothing  but  faith  in  the  remedial  forces  of  the  soul 
can  give.  You  see  his  sensualism;  you  see  his 
want  of  those  tastes  and  perceptions  which  make 
the  power  and  safety  of  your  character.  Very 
likely.  But  he  has  something  else.  If  he  has  his 
own  vice,  he  has  its  correlative  virtue.  Every 
mind  should  be  allowed  to  make  its  own  statement 
in  action,  and  its  balance  will  appear.  In  these 
judgments  one  needs  that  foresight  which  was  at- 
tributed to  an  eminent  reformer,  of  whom  it  was 
said  "  his  patience  could  see  in  the  bud  of  the  aloe 
the  blossom  at  the  end  of  a  hundred  years."  Alas 
for  the  cripple  Practice  when  it  seeks  to  come  up 
with  the  bird  Theory,  which  flies  before  it.  Try 
your  design  on  the  best  school.  The  scholars  are 
of  all  ages  and  temperaments  and  capacities.  It 
is  difficult  to  class  them,  some  are  too  young,  some 
are  slow,  some  perverse.  Each  requires  so  much 
consideration,  that  the  morning  hope  of  the  teacher, 
of  a  day  of  love  and  progress,  is  often  closed  at 
evening  by  despair.  Each  single  case,  the  more 
it  is  considered,  shows  more  to  be  done;  and  the 


150  EDUCATION. 

strict  conditions  of  the  hours,  on  one  side,  and 
the  number  of  tasks,  on  the  other.  Whatever  be- 
comes of  our  method,  the  conditions  stand  fast,  — 
six  hours,  and  thirty,  fifty,  or  a  hundred  and  fifty 
pupils.  Something  must  be  done,  and  done  speed- 
ily, and  in  this  distress  the  wisest  are  tempted  to 
adopt  violent  means,  to  proclaim  martial  law,  cor- 
poral punishment,  mechanical  arrangement,  bribes, 
spies,  wrath,  main  strength  and  ignorance,  in  lieu 
of  that  wise  genial  providential  influence  they  had 
hoped,  and  yet  hope  at  some  future  day  to  adopt. 
Of  course  the  devotion  to  details  reacts  injuriously 
on  the  teacher.  He  cannot  indulge  his  genius,  he 
cannot  delight  in  personal  relations  with  young 
friends,  when  his  eye  is  always  on  the  clock,  and 
twenty  classes  are  to  be  dealt  with  before  the  day 
is  done.  Besides,  how  can  he  please  himself  with 
genius,  and  foster  modest  virtue  ?  A  sure  propor- 
tion of  rogue  and  dunce  finds  its  way  into  every 
school  and  requires  a  cruel  share  of  time,  and  the 
gentle  teacher,  who  wished  to  be  a  Providence  to 
youth,  is  grown  a  martinet,  sore  with  suspicions ; 
knows  as  much  vice  as  the  judge  of  a  police  court, 
and  his  love  of  learning  is  lost  in  the  routine  of 
grammars  and  books  of  elements. 

A  rule  is  so  easy  that  it  does  not  need  a  man  to 
apply  it ;  an  automaton,  a  machine,  can  be  made 
to    keep  a  school  so.      It    facilitates    labor    and 


EDUCATION.  151 

thought  so  much  that  there  is  always  the  tempta- 
tion in  large  schools  to  omit  the  endless  task  of 
meeting  the  wants  of  each  single  mind,  and  to  gov- 
ern by  steam.  But  it  is  at  frightful  cost.  Our 
modes  of  Education  aim  to  expedite,  to  save  labor  ; 
to  do  for  masses  what  cannot  be  done  for  masses, 
what  must  be  done  reverently,  one  by  one:  say 
rather,  the  whole  world  is  needed  for  the  tuition  of 
each  pupil.  The  advantages  of  this  system  of  em- 
ulation and  display  are  so  prompt  and  obvious,  it 
is  such  a  time-saver,  it  is  so  energetic  on  slow  and 
on  bad  natures,  and  is  of  so  easy  application,  need- 
ing no  sage  or  poet,  but  any  tutor  or  schoolmaster 
in  his  first  term  can  apply  it, — that  it  is  not 
strange  that  this  calomel  of  culture  should  be  a 
popular  medicine.  On  the  other  hand,  total  absti- 
nence from  this  drug,  and  the  adoption  of  simple 
discipline  and  the  following  of  nature,  involves  at 
once  immense  claims  on  the  time,  the  thoughts,  on 
the  life  of  the  teacher.  It  requires  time,  use,  in- 
sight, event,  all  the  great  lessons  and  assistances  of 
God ;  and  only  to  think  of  using  it  implies  charac- 
ter and  profoundness  ;  to  enter  on  this  course  of 
discipline  is  to  be  good  and  great.  It  is  precisely 
analogous  to  the  difference  between  the  use  of  cor- 
poral punishment  and  the  methods  of  love.  It  is 
so  easy  to  bestow  on  a  bad  boy  a  blow,  overpower 
aim,  and  get  obedience  without  words,  that  in  this 


152  EDUCATION. 

world  of  hurry  and  distraction,  who  can  wait  for 
the  returns  of  reason  and  the  conquest  of  self ;  in 
the  uncertainty  too  whether  that  will  ever  come  ? 
And  yet  the  familiar  observation  of  the  universal 
compensations  might  suggest  the  fear  that  so  sum- 
mary a  stop  of  a  bad  humor  was  more  jeopardous 
than  its  continuance. 

Now  the  correction  of  this  quack  practice  is  to 
import  into  Education  the  wisdom  of  life.  Leave 
this  military  hurry  and  adopt  the  pace  of  Nature. 
Her  secret  is  patience.  Do  you  know  how  the  nat- 
uralist learns  all  the  secrets  of  the  forest,  of  plants, 
of  birds,  of  beasts,  of  reptiles,  of  fishes,  of  the 
rivers  and  the  sea  ?  When  he  goes  into  the  woods 
the  birds  fly  before  him  and  he  finds  none ;  when 
he  goes  to  the  river  bank,  the  fish  and  the  reptile 
swim  away  and  leave  him  alone.  His  secret  is  pa- 
tience ;  he  sits  down,  and  sits  still ;  he  is  a  statue ; 
he  is  a  log.  These  creatures  have  no  value  for 
their  time,  and  he  must  put  as  low  a  rate  on  his. 
By  dint  of  obstinate  sitting  still,  reptile,  fish,  bird 
and  beast,  which  all  wish  to  return  to  their  haunts, 
begin  to  return.  He  sits  still ;  if  they  approach, 
he  remains  passive  as  the  stone  he  sits  upon.  They 
lose  their  fear.  They  have  curiosity  too  about  him. 
By  and  by  the  curiosity  masters  the  fear,  and  they 
come  swimming,  creeping  and  flying  towards  him  ; 
and  as  he  is  still  immovable,  they  not  only  resume 


EDUCATION.  153 

their  haunts  and  their  ordinary  labors  and  man- 
ners, show  themselves  to  him  in  their  work-day 
trim,  but  also  volunteer  some  degree  of  advances 
towards  fellowship  and  good  understanding  with 
a  biped  who  behaves  so  civilly  and  well.  Can  you 
not  baffle  the  impatience  and  passion  of  the  child 
by  your  tranquillity?  Can  you  not  wait  for  him, 
as  Nature  and  Providence  do  ?  Can  you  not  keep 
for  his  mind  and  ways,  for  his  secret,  the  same  cu- 
riosity you  give  to  the  squirrel,  snake,  rabbit,  and 
the  sheldrake  and  the  deer  ?  He  has  a  secret ; 
wonderful  methods  in  him  ;  he  is,  —  every  child,  — . 
a  new  style  of  man ;  give  him  time  and  oppor- 
tunity. Talk  of  Columbus  and  Newton !  I  tell 
you  the  child  just  born  in  yonder  hovel  is  the  be- 
ginning of  a  revolution  as  great  as  theirs.  But 
you  must  have  the  believing  and  prophetic  eye. 
Have  the  self-command  you  wish  to  inspire.  Your 
teaching  and  discipline  must  have  the  reserve  and 
taciturnity  of  Nature.  Teach  them  to  hold  their 
tongues  by  holding  your  own.  Say  little ;  do  not 
snarl ;  do  not  chide ;  but  govern  by  the  eye.  See 
what  they  need,  and  that  the  right  thing  is  done. 

I  confess  myself  utterly  at  a  loss  in  suggesting 
particular  reforms  in  our  ways  of  teaching.  No  dis- 
cretion that  can  be  lodged  with  a  school-committee, 
with  the  overseers  or  visitors  of  an  academy,  of  a 
college,  can  at  all  avail  to  reach  these  difficulties 


154  EDUCATION. 

and  perplexities,  but  they  solve  themselves  when 
we  leave  institutions  and  address  individuals.  The 
will,  the  male  power,  organizes,  imposes  its  own 
thought  and  wish  on  others,  and  makes  that  mili- 
tary eye  which  controls  boys  as  it  controls  men ; 
admirable  in  its  results,  a  fortune  to  him  who  has 
it,  and  only  dangerous  when  it  leads  the  workman 
to  overvalue  and  overuse  it  and  precludes  him  from 
finer  means.  Sympathy,  the  female  force,  —  which 
they  must  use  who  have  not  the  first,  —  deficient 
in  instant  control  and  the  breaking  down  of  re- 
sistance, is  more  subtle  and  lasting  and  creative. 
I  advise  teachers  to  cherish  mother-wit.  I  assume 
that  you  will  keep  the  grammar,  reading,  writing 
and  arithmetic  in  order ;  't  is  easy  and  of  course 
you  will.  But  smuggle  in  a  little  contraband  wit, 
fancy,  imagination,  thought.  If  you  have  a  taste 
which  you  have  suppressed  because  it  is  not  shared 
by  those  about  you,  tell  them  that.  Set  this  law  up, 
whatever  becomes  of  the  rules  of  the  school :  they 
must  not  whisper,  much  less  talk  ;  but  if  one  of  the 
young  people  says  a  wise  thing,  greet  it,  and  let  all 
the  children  clap  their  hands.  They  shall  have  no 
book  but  school-books  in  the  room ;  but  if  one  has 
brought  in  a  Plutarch  or  Shakspeare  or  Don  Quix- 
ote or  Goldsmith  or  any  other  good  book,  and  un- 
derstands what  he  reads,  put  him  at  once  at  the 
head  of  the  class.     Nobody  shall  be  disorderly,  or 


EDUCATION.  155 

leave  his  desk  without  permission,  but  if  a  boy  runs 
from  his  bench,  or  a  girl,  because  the  fire  falls,  or 
to  check  some  injury  that  a  little  dastard  is  inflict- 
ing behind  his  desk  on  some  helpless  sufferer,  take 
away  the  medal  from  the  head  of  the  class  and  give 
it  on  the  instant  to  the  brave  rescuer.  If  a  child 
happens  to  show  that  he  knows  any  fact  about  as- 
tronomy, or  plants,  or  birds,  or  rocks,  or  history, 
that  interests  him  and  you,  hush  all  the  classes  and 
encourage  him  to  tell  it  so  that  all  may  hear.  Then 
you  have  made  your  school-room  like  the  world. 
Of  course  you  will  insist  on  modesty  in  the  chil- 
dren, and  respect  to  their  teachers,  but  if  the  boy 
stops  you  in  your  speech,  cries  out  that  you  are 
wrong  and  sets  you  right,  hug  him ! 

To  whatsoever  upright  mind,  to  whatsoever 
beating  heart  I  speak,  to  you  it  is  committed 
to  educate  men.  By  simple  living,  by  an  illim- 
itable soul,  you  inspire,  you  correct,  you  instruct, 
you  raise,  you  embellish  all.  By  your  own  act  you 
teach  the  beholder  how  to  do  the  practicable.  Ac- 
cording to  the  depth  from  which  you  draw  your 
\ife,  such  is  the  depth  not  only  of  your  strenuous 
effort,  but  of  your  manners  and  presence. 

The  beautiful  nature  of  the  world  has  here 
Mended  your  happiness  with  your  power.  Work 
straight  on  in  absolute  duty,  and  you  lend  an  arm 
and  an  encouragement  to  all  the  youth  of  the  uni- 


156  EDUCATION. 

verse.  Consent  yourself  to  be  an  organ  of  your 
Ugliest  thought,  and  lo !  suddenly  you  put  all  men 
in  your  debt,  and  are  the  fountain  of  an  energy  that 
goes  pulsing  on  with  waves  of  benefit  to  the  borders 
of  society,  to  the  circumference  of  things. 


THE   SUPERLATIVE. 


When  wrath  and  terror  changed  Jove's  regal  port 
And  the  rash-leaping  thunderbolt  fell  short. 


For  Art,  for  Music  overthrilled, 

The  wine-cup  shakes,  the  wine  is  spilled. 


THE  SUPERLATIVE.1 


The  doctrine  of  temperance  is  one  of  many 
degrees.  It  is  usually  taught  on  a  low  platform, 
but  one  of  great  necessity,  —  that  of  meats  and 
drinks,  and  its  importance  cannot  be  denied  and 
hardly  exaggerated.  But  it  is  a  long  way  from  the 
Maine  Law  to  the  heights  of  absolute  self-command 
which  respect  the  conservatism  of  the  entire  ener- 
gies of  the  body,  the  mind,  and  the  soul.  I  wish 
to  point  at  some  of  its  higher  functions  as  it  enters 
into  mind  and  character. 

There  is  a  superlative  temperament  which  has 
no  medium  range,  but  swiftly  oscillates  from  the 
freezing  to  the  boiling  point,  and  which  affects  the 
manners  of  those  who  share  it  with  a  certain  des- 
peration. Their  aspect  is  grimace.  They  go  tear- 
ing, convulsed  through  life,  —  wailing,  praying,  ex- 
claiming, swearing.  We  talk,  sometimes,  with  peo- 
ple whose  conversation  would  lead  you  to  suppose 
that  they  had  lived  in  a  museum,  where  all  the 
objects  were  monsters  and  extremes.  Their  good 
1  Reprinted  from  the  Century  of  February,  1882. 


160  THE  SUPERLATIVE. 

people  are  phoenixes;  their  naughty  are  like  the 
prophet's  figs.  They  use  the  superlative  of  gram- 
mar :  "  most  perfect,"  "  most  exquisite,"  "  most 
horrible."  Like  the  French,  they  are  enchanted, 
they  are  desolate,  because  you  have  got  or  have  not 
got  a  shoe-string  or  a  wafer  you  happen  to  want,  — 
not  perceiving  that  superlatives  are  diminutives, 
and  weaken ;  that  the  positive  is  the  sinew  of 
speech,  the  superlative  the  fat.  If  the  talker  lose 
a  tooth,  he  thinks  the  universal  thaw  and  dissolu- 
tion of  things  has  come.  Controvert  his  opinion 
and  he  cries  "  Persecution  !  "  and  reckons  himself 
with  Saint  Barnabas,  who  was  sawn  in  two. 

Especially  we  note  this  tendency  to  extremes 
in  the  pleasant  excitement  of  horror-mongers.  Is 
there  something  so  delicious  in  disasters  and  pain  ? 
Bad  news  is  always  exaggerated,  and  we  may  chal- 
lenge Providence  to  send  a  fact  so  tragical  that  we 
cannot  contrive  to  make  it  a  little  worse  in  our 
gossip. 

All  this  comes  of  poverty.  We  are  unskilful 
defmers.  From  want  of  skill  to  convey  quality, 
we  hope  to  move  admiration  by  quantity.  Lan- 
guage should  aim  to  describe  the  fact.  It  is  not 
enough  to  suggest  it  and  magnify  it.  Sharper 
sight  would  indicate  the  true  line.  '  T  is  very  wea- 
risome, this  straining  talk,  these  experiences  all 
exquisite,  intense  and  tremendous,  —  "  The  best  I 


THE  SUPERLATIVE.  161 

ever  saw ; "  "I  never  in  my  life  !  "  One  wishes 
these  terms  gazetted  and  forbidden.  Every  favor- 
ite is  not  a  cherub,  nor  every  cat  a  griffin,  nor  each 
unpleasing  person  a  dark,  diabolical  intriguer ;  nor 
agonies,  excruciations  nor  ecstasies  our  daily  bread. 

Horace  Walpole  relates  that  in  the  expecta- 
tion, current  in  London  a  century  ago,  of  a  great 
earthquake,  some  people  provided  themselves  with 
dresses  for  the  occasion.  But  one  would  not  wear 
earthquake  dresses  or  resurrection  robes  for  a  work- 
ing jacket,  nor  make  a  codicil  to  his  will  whenever 
he  goes  out  to  ride;  and  the  secrets  of  death, 
judgment  and  eternity  are  tedious  when  recurring 
as  minute-guns.  Thousands  of  people  live  and  die 
who  were  never,  on  a  single  occasion,  hungry  or 
thirsty,  or  furious  or  terrified.  The  books  say,  "  It 
made  my  hair  stand  on  end  !  "  Who,  in  our  muni- 
cipal life,  ever  had  such  an  experience  ?  Indeed, 
I  believe  that  much  of  the  rhetoric  of  terror,  — 
"  It  froze  my  blood,"  "  It  made  my  knees  knock," 
etc.  —  most  men  have  realized  only  in  dreams  and 
nightmares. 

Then  there  is  an  inverted  superlative,  or  superla- 
tive contrary,  which  shivers,  like  Demophoon,  in 
the  sun :  wants  fan  and  parasol  on  the  cold  Friday ; 
is  tired  by  sleep ;  feeds  on  drugs  and  poisons ;  finds 
the  rainbow  a  discoloration ;  hates  birds  and  flow* 
ers. 


162  THE  SUPERLATIVE. 

The  exaggeration  of  which  I  complain  makes 
plain  fact  the  more  welcome  and  refreshing.  It  is 
curious  that  a  face  magnified  in  a  concave  mirror 
loses  its  expression.  All  this  overstatement  is 
needless.  A  little  fact  is  worth  a  whole  limbo  of 
dreams,  and  I  can  well  spare  the  exaggerations 
which  appear  to  me  screens  to  conceal  ignorance. 
Among  these  gloriflers,  the  coldest  stickler  for 
names  and  dates  and  measures  cannot  lament  his 
criticism  and  coldness  of  fancy.  Think  how  much 
pains  astronomers  and  opticians  have  taken  to  pro- 
cure an  achromatic  lens.  Discovery  in  the  heavens 
has  waited  for  it ;  discovery  on  the  face  of  the  earth 
not  less.  I  hear  without  sympathy  the  complaint 
of  young  and  ardent  persons  that  they  find  life  no 
region  of  romance,  with  no  enchanter,  no  giant,  no 
fairies,  nor  even  muses.  I  am  very  much  indebted 
to  my  eyes,  and  am  content  that  they  should  see 
the  real  world,  always  geometrically  finished  with- 
out blur  or  halo.  The  more  I  am  engaged  with  it 
the  more  it  suffices. 

How  impatient  we  are,  in  these  northern  lati- 
tudes, of  looseness  and  intemperance  in  speech ! 
Our  measure  of  success  is  the  moderation  and  low 
level  of  an  individual's  judgment.  Doctor  Chan- 
ning's  piety  and  wisdom  had  such  weight  that,  in 
Boston,  the  popular  idea  of  religion  was  whatever 
this  eminent  divine  held.     But   T  remember  that 


THE  SUPERLATIVE.  163 

his  best  friend,  a  man  of  guarded  lips,  speaking  of 
him  in  a  circle  of  his  admirers,  said :  "  I  have 
known  him  long,  I  have  studied  his  character,  and 
I  believe  him  capable  of  virtue."  An  eminent 
French  journalist  paid  a  high  compliment  to  the 
Duke  of  Wellington,  when  his  documents  were 
published  :  "  Here  are  twelve  volumes  of  military 
dispatches,  and  the  word  glory  is  not  found  in 
them." 

The  English  mind  is  arithmetical,  values  exact- 
ness, likes  literal  statement ;  stigmatizes  any  heat 
or  hyperbole  as  Irish,  French,  Italian,  and  infers 
weakness  and  inconsequence  of  character  in  speak- 
ers who  use  it.  It  does  not  love  the  superlative 
but  the  positive  degree.  Our  customary  and  me- 
chanical existence  is  not  favorable  to  flights  ;  long 
nights  and  frost  hold  us  pretty  fast  to  realities. 
The  people  of  English  stock,  in  all  countries,  are  a 
solid  people,  wearing  good  hats  and  shoes,  and  own- 
ers of  land  whose  title-deeds  are  properly  recorded. 
Their  houses  are  of  wood,  and  brick,  and  stone,  not 
designed  to  reel  in  earthquakes,  nor  blow  about 
through  the  air  much  in  hurricanes,  nor  to  be  lost 
under  sand-drifts,  nor  to  be  made  bonfires  of  by 
whimsical  viziers  ;  but  to  stand  as  commodious, 
rentable  tenements  for  a  century  or  two.  All  our 
manner  of  life  is  on  a  secure  and  moderate  pattern, 
such  as  can  last.     Violence  and  extravagance  are, 


164  THE  SUPERLATIVE. 

once  for  all,  distasteful ;  competence,  quiet,  com- 
fort, are  the  agreed  welfare. 

Ever  a  low  style  is  best.  "I  judge  by  every 
man's  truth  of  his  degree  of  understanding,"  said 
Chesterfield.  And  I  do  not  know  any  advantage 
more  conspicuous  which  a  man  owes  to  his  experi- 
ence in  markets  and  the  Exchange,  or  politics,  than 
the  caution  and  accuracy  he  acquires  in  his  report 
of  facts.  "  Uncle  Joel's  news  is  always  true,"  said 
a  person  to  me  with  obvious  satisfaction,  and  said 
it  justly  ;  for  the  old  head,  after  deceiving  and  be- 
ing deceived  many  times,  thinks,  "  What 's  the  use 
of  having  to  unsay  to-day  what  I  said  yesterday  ? 
I  will  not  be  responsible  ;  I  will  not  add  an  epi- 
thet. I  will  be  as  moderate  as  the  fact,  and  will 
use  the  same  expression,  without  color,  which  I  re- 
ceived ;  and  rather  repeat  it  several  times,  word 
for  word,  than  vary  it  ever  so  little." 

The  first  valuable  power  in  a  reasonable  mind, 
one  would  say,  was  the  power  of  plain  statement, 
or  the  power  to  receive  things  as  they  befall,  and 
to  transfer  the  picture  of  them  to  another  mind  un- 
altered. 'T  is  a  good  rule  of  rhetoric  which  Schle- 
gel  gives,  —  "In  good  prose,  every  word  is  under- 
scored ; "  which,  I  suppose,  means,  Never  italicize. 

Spartans,  stoics,  heroes,  saints  and  gods  use  a 
short  and  positive  speech.  They  are  never  off  their 
centres.     As  soon  as  they  swell  and  paint  and  find 


THE  SUPERLATIVE.  165 

truth  not  enough  for  them,  softening  of  the  brain 
has  already  begun.  It  seems  as  if  inflation  were  a 
disease  incident  to  too  much  use  of  words,  and  the 
remedy  lay  in  recourse  to  things.  I  am  daily 
struck  with  the  forcible  understatement  of  people 
who  have  no  literary  habit.  The  low  expression  is 
strong  and  agreeable.  The  citizen  dwells  in  delu- 
sions. His  dress  and  draperies,  house  and  stables, 
occupy  him.  The  poor  countryman,  having  no  cir- 
cumstance of  carpets,  coaches,  dinners,  wine  and 
dancing  in  his  head  to  confuse  him,  is  able  to  look 
straight  at  you,  without  refraction  or  prismatic  glo- 
ries, and  he  sees  whether  you  see  straight  also,  or 
whether  your  head  is  addled  by  this  mixture  of 
wines. 

The  common  people  diminish  :  "  a  cold  snap  ;  " 
"  it  rains  easy  ;  "  "  good  haying  weather."  When 
a  farmer  means  to  tell  you  that  he  is  doing  well 
with  his  farm,  he  says,  "  I  don't  work  as  hard  as  I 
did,  and  I  don't  mean  to."  When  he  wishes  to 
condemn  any  treatment  of  soils  or  of  stock,  he  says, 
"  It  won't  do  any  good."  Under  the  Catskill 
Mountains  the  boy  in  the  steamboat  said,  "  Come 
up  here,  Tony  ;  it  looks  pretty  out-of-doors."  The 
farmers  in  the  region  do  not  call  particular  sum- 
mits, as  Killington,  Camel's  Hump,  Saddle-back, 
etc.,  mountains,  but  only  "  them  'ere  rises,"  and 
reserve  the  word  mountains  for  the  range. 


166  THE  SUPERLATIVE. 

I  once  attended,  a  dinner  given  to  a  great  state 
functionary  by  functionaries,  —  men  of  law,  state, 
and  trade.  The  guest  was  a  great  man  in  his  own 
country  and  an  honored  diplomatist  in  this.  His 
health  was  drunk  with  some  acknowledgment  of  his 
distinguished  services  to  both  countries,  and  fol- 
lowed by  nine  cold  hurrahs.  There  was  the  vicious 
superlative.  Then  the  great  official  spoke  and  beat 
his  breast,  and  declared  that  he  should  remember 
this  honor  to  the  latest  moment  of  his  existence. 
He  was  answered  again  by  officials.  Pity,  thought 
I,  they  should  lie  so  about  their  keen  sensibility 
to  the  nine  cold  hurrahs  and  to  the  commonplace 
compliment  of  a  dinner.  Men  of  the  world  value 
truth,  in  proportion  to  their  ability ;  not  by  its  sa- 
credness,  but  for  its  convenience.  Of  such,  espe- 
cially of  diplomatists,  one  has  a  right  to  expect  wit 
and  ingenuity  to  avoid  the  lie  if  they  must  comply 
with  the  form.  Now,  I  had  been  present,  a  little 
before,  in  the  country  at  a  cattle-show  dinner, 
which  followed  an  agricultural  discourse  delivered 
by  a  farmer  :  the  discourse,  to  say  the  truth,  was 
bad  ;  and  one  of  our  village  fathers  gave  at  the 
dinner  this  toast  :  "  The  orator  of  the  day :  his 
subject  deserves  the  attention  of  every  farmer." 
The  caution  of  the  toast  did  honor  to  our  village 
father.  I  wish  great  lords  and  diplomatists  had  as 
much  respect  for  truth. 


THE  SUPERLATIVE.  167 

But  whilst  thus  everything  recommends  simplic- 
ity and  temperance  of  action ;  the  utmost  direct- 
ness, the  positive  degree,  we  mean  thereby  that 
"  rightly  to  be  great  is  not  to  stir  without  great  ar- 
gument." Whenever  the  true  objects  of  action  ap- 
pear, they  are  to  be  heartily  sought.  Enthusiasm 
is  the  height  of  man ;  it  is  the  passing  from  the 
human  to  the  divine. 

The  superlative  is  as  good  as  the  positive,  if  it  be 
alive.  If  man  loves  the  conditioned,  he  also  loves 
the  unconditioned.  We  don't  wish  to  sin  on  the 
other  side,  and  to  be  purists,  nor  to  check  the  in- 
vention of  wit  or  the  sally  of  humor.  'T  is  very 
different,  this  weak  and  wearisome  lie,  from  the 
stimulus  to  the  fancy  which  is  given  by  a  romanc- 
ing talker  who  does  not  mean  to  be  exactly  taken, 
—  like  the  gallant  skipper  who  complained  to  his 
owners  that  he  had  pumped  the  Atlantic  Ocean 
three  times  through  his  ship  on  the  passage,  and 
't  was  common  to  strike  seals  and  porpoises  in  the 
hold.  Or  what  was  similarly  asserted  of  the  late 
Lord  Jeffrey,  at  the  Scottish  bar,  —  an  attentive 
auditor  declaring  on  one  occasion  after  an  argu- 
ment of  three  hours,  that  he  had  spoken  the  whole 
English  language  three  times  over  in  his  speech. 

The  objection  to  unmeasured  speech  is  its  lie. 
All  men  like  an  impressive  fact.  The  astronomer 
shows  you  in  his  telescope  the  nebula  of  Orion,  that 


168  THE  SUPERLATIVE. 

you  may  look  on  that  which  is  esteemed  the  far- 
thest-off  land  in  visible  nature.  At  the  Bank  of 
England  they  put  a  scrap  of  paper  that  is  worth  a 
million  pounds  sterling  into  the  hands  of  the  vis- 
itor to  touch.  Our  travelling  is  a  sort  of  search  for 
the  superlatives  or  summits  of  art,  —  much  more 
the  real  wonders  of  power  in  the  human  form. 
The  arithmetic  of  Newton,  the  memory  of  Maglia- 
becchi  or  Mirandola,  the  versatility  of  Julius  Csesar, 
the  concentration  of  Bonaparte,  the  inspiration  of 
Shakspeare,  are  sure  of  commanding  interest  and 
awe  in  every  company  of  men. 

The  superlative  is  the  excess  of  expression.  We 
are  a  garrulous,  demonstrative  kind  of  creatures, 
and  cannot  live  without  much  outlet  for  all  our 
sense  and  nonsense.  And  fit  expression  is  so  rare 
that  mankind  have  a  superstitious  value  for  it,  and 
it  would  seem  the  whole  human  race  agree  to  value 
a  man  precisely  in  proportion  to  his  power  of  ex- 
pression ;  and  to  the  most  expressive  man  that  has 
existed,  namely,  Shakspeare,  they  have  awarded  the 
highest  place. 

The  expressors  are  the  gods  of  the  world,  but 
the  men  whom  these  expressors  revere  are  the  solid, 
balanced,  undemonstrative  citizens  who  make  the 
reserved  guard,  the  central  sense,  of  the  world. 
For  the  luminous  object  wastes  itself  by  its  shining, 
— ■  is  luminous  because  it  is  burning  up ;  and  if  the 


THE  SUPERLATIVE.  169 

powers  are  disposed  for  display,  there  is  all  the  less 
left  for  use  and  creation.  The  talent  sucks  the 
substance  of  the  man.  Superlatives  must  be  bought 
by  too  many  positives.  Gardens  of  roses  must  be 
stripped  to  make  a  few  drops  of  otto.  And  these 
raptures  of  fire  and  frost,  which  indeed  cleanse 
pedantry  out  of  conversation  and  make  the  speech 
salt  and  biting,  would  cost  me  the  days  of  well- 
being  which  are  now  so  cheap  to  me,  yet  so  valued. 
I  like  no  deep  stakes.  I  am  a  coward  at  gambling. 
I  will  bask  in  the  common  sun  a  while  longer. 

Children  and  thoughtless  people  like  exagger- 
ated event  and  activity ;.  like  to  run  to  a  house  on 
fire,  to  a  fight,  to  an  execution ;  like  to  talk  of  a 
marriage,  of  a  bankruptcy,  of  a  debt,  of  a  crime. 
The  wise  man  shuns  all  this.  I  knew  a  grave  man 
who,  being  urged  to  go  to  a  church  where  a  clergy- 
man was  newly  ordained,  said  "  he  liked  him  very 
well,  but  he  would  go  when  the  interesting  Sundays 
were  over." 

All  rests  at  last  on  the  simplicity  of  nature,  or 
real  being.  Nothing  is  for  the  most  part  less  es- 
teemed. We  are  fond  of  dress,  of  ornament,  of 
accomplishments,  of  talents,  but  distrustful  of 
health,  of  soundness,  of  pure  innocence.  Yet  na- 
ture measures  her  greatness  by  what  she  can  spare, 
by  what  remains  when  all  superfluity  and  accesso- 
ries are  shorn  off. 


170  THE  SUPERLATIVE. 

Nor  is  there  in  nature  itself  any  swell,  any  brag, 
any  strain  or  shock,  but  a  firm  common  sense 
through  all  her  elephants  and  lions,  through  all 
her  ducks  and  geese ;  a  true  proportion  between 
her  means  and  her  performance.  Semper  sibi  sim- 
ilis.  You  shall  not  catch  her  in  any  anomalies, 
nor  swaggering  into  any  monsters.  In  all  the  years 
that  I  have  sat  in  town  and  forest,  I  never  saw  a 
winged  dragon,  a  flying  man,  or  a  talking  fish,  but 
ever  the  sti'ictest  regard  to  rule,  and  an  absence  of 
all  surprises.  No;  nature  encourages  no  looseness, 
pardons  no  errors  ;  freezes  punctually  at  32°,  boils 
punctually  at  212°  ;  crystallizes  in  water  at  one  in- 
variable angle,  in  diamond  at  one,  in  granite  at 
one  ;  and  if  you  omit  the  smallest  condition  the  ex- 
periment will  not  succeed.  Her  communication 
obeys  the  gospel  rule,  yea  or  nay.  She  never  ex- 
patiates, never  goes  into  the  reasons.  Plant  beech- 
mast  and  it  comes  up,  or  it  does  not  come  up.  Sow 
grain,  and  it  does  not  come  up :  put  lime  into  the 
soil  and  try  again,  and  this  time  she  says  yea.  To 
every  question  an  abstemious  but  absolute  reply. 
The  like  staidness  is  in  her  dealings  with  us.  Na- 
ture is  always  serious,  —  does  not  jest  with  us. 
Where  we  have  begun  in  folly,  we  are  brought 
quickly  to  plain  dealing.  Life  could  not  be  car- 
ried on  except  by  fidelity  and  good  earnest ;  and 
she  brings  the  most  heartless  trifler  to  determined 


THE  SUPERLATIVE.  171 

purpose  presently.  The  men  whom  she  admits  to 
her  confidence,  the  simple  and  great  characters,  are 
uniformly  marked  by  absence  of  pretension  and  by 
understatement.  The  old  and  the  modern  sages  of 
clearest  insight  are  plain  men,  who  have  held  them- 
selves hard  to  the  poverty  of  nature. 

The  firmest  and  noblest  ground  on  which  people 
can  live  is  truth  ;  the  real  with  the  real ;  a  ground 
on  which  nothing  is  assumed,  but  where  they  speak 
and  think  and  do  what  they  must,  because  they  are 
so  and  not  otherwise. 

But  whilst  the  basis  of  character  must  be  sim- 
plicity, the  expression  of  character,  it  must  be  re- 
membered, is,  in  great  degree,  a  matter  of  climate. 
In  the  temperate  climates  there  is  a  temperate 
speech,  in  torrid  climates  an  ardent  one.  Whilst 
in  Western  nations  the  superlative  in  conversation 
is  tedious  and  weak,  and  in  character  is  a  capital 
defect,  nature  delights  in  showing  us  that  in  the 
East  it  is  animated,  it  is  pertinent,  pleasing,  poetic. 
Whilst  she  appoints  us  to  keep  within  the  sharp 
boundaries  of  form  as  the  condition  of  our  strength, 
she  creates  in  the  East  the  uncontrollable  yearning 
to  escape  from  limitation  into  the  vast  and  bound- 
less ;  to  use  a  freedom  of  fancy  which  plays  with 
all  the  works  of  nature,  great  or  minute,  galaxy  or 
grain  of  dust,  as  toys  and  words  of  the  mind ;  in- 
culcates the  tenet  of  a  beatitude  to  be  found  in  es- 


172  THE  SUPERLATIVE. 

cape  from  all  organization  and  all  personality,  and 
makes  ecstasy  an  institution. 

Religion  and  poetry  are  all  the  civilization  of  the 
Arab.  "The  ground  of  Paradise,"  said  Moham- 
med, "  is  extensive,  and  the  plants  of  it  are  hallelu- 
jahs." Eeligion  and  poetry  :  the  religion  teaches 
an  inexorable  destiny;  it  distinguishes  only  two 
days  in  each  man's  history,  the  day  of  his  lot,  and 
the  day  of  judgment.  The  religion  runs  into  ascet- 
icism and  fate.  The  costume,  the  articles  in  which 
wealth  is  displayed,  are  in  the  same  extremes. 
Thus  the  diamond  and  the  pearl,  which  are  only 
accidental  and  secondary  in  their  use  and  value  to 
us,  are  proper  to  the  oriental  world.  The  diver 
dives  a  beggar  and  rises  with  the  price  of  a  king- 
dom in  his  hand.  A  bag  of  sequins,  a  jewel,  a  bal- 
sam, a  single  horse,  constitute  an  estate  in  coun- 
tries where  insecure  institutions  make  every  one 
desirous  of  concealable  and  convertible  property. 
Shall  I  say,  further,  that  the  orientals  excel  in 
costly  arts,  in  the  cutting  of  precious  stones,  in 
working  in  gold,  in  weaving  on  hand-looms  costly 
stuffs  from  silk  and  wool,  in  spices,  in  dyes  and 
drugs,  henna,  otto  and  camphor,  and  in  the  train- 
ing of  slaves,  elephants  and  camels,  —  things  which 
are  the  poetry  and  superlative  of  commerce. 

On  the  other  hand,  —  and  it  is  a  good  illustra- 
tion of  the  difference  of  genius,  —  the  European 


THE  SUPERLATIVE.  173 

nations,  and,  in  general,  all  nations  in  proportion 
to  their  civilization,  understand  the  manufacture  o£ 
iron.  One  of  the  meters  of  the  height  to  which 
any  civility  rose  is  the  skill  in  the  fabric  of  iron. 
Universally,  the  better  gold,  the  worse  man.  The 
political  economist  defies  us  to  show  any  gold-mine 
country  that  is  traversed  by  good  roads  :  or  a  shore 
where  pearls  are  found  on  which  good  schools  are 
erected.  The  European  civility,  or  that  of  the 
positive  degree,  is  established  by  coal-mines,  by 
ventilation,  by  irrigation  and  every  skill  —  in  hav- 
ing water  cheap  and  pure,  by  iron,  by  agriculture 
for  bread-stuffs,  and  manufacture  of  coarse  and 
family  cloths.  Our  modern  improvements  have 
been  in  the  invention  of  friction  matches  ;  of  India- 
rubber  shoes ;  of  the  famous  two  parallel  bars  of 
iron ;  then  of  the  air-chamber  of  Watt,  and  of  the 
judicious  tubing  of  the  engine,  by  Stephenson,  in 
order  to  the  construction  of  locomotives. 

Meantime,  Nature,  who  loves  crosses  and  mix- 
tures, makes  these  two  tendencies  necessary  each  to 
the  other,  and  delights  to  re-enforce  each  peculiar- 
ity by  imparting  the  other.  The  Northern  genius 
finds  itself  singularly  refreshed  and  stimulated  by 
the  breadth  and  luxuriance  of  Eastern  imagery  and 
modes  of  thinking,  which  go  to  check  the  pedantry 
of  our  inventions  and  the  excess  of  our  detail. 
There  is  no  writing  which  has  more  electric  power 


174  THE  SUPERLATIVE. 

to  unbind  and  animate  the  torpid  intellect  than  the 
bold  Eastern  muse. 

If  it  come  back  however  to  the  question  of  final 
superiority,  it  is  too  plain  that  there  is  no  question 
that  the  star  of  empire  rolls  West :  that  the  warm 
sons  of  the  Southeast  have  bent  the  neck  under  the 
yoke  of  the  cold  temperament  and  the  exact  under' 
standing  of  the  Northwestern  races. 


THE   SOVEREIGNTY  OF  ETHICS. 


These  rules  were  writ  in  human  heart 
By  Him  who  built  the  day  ; 

The  columns  of  the  universe 
Not  firmer  based  than  they. 


Thou  shalt  not  try 
To  plant  thy  shrivelled  pedantry 
On  the  shoulders  of  the  sky. 


THE  SOVEREIGNTY  OF  ETHICS. 


Since  the  discovery  of  Oersted  that  galvanism 
and  electricity  and  magnetism  are  only  forms  of 
one  and  the  same  force,  and  convertible  each  into 
the  other,  we  have  continually  suggested  to  us  a 
larger  generalization :  that  each  of  the  great  depart- 
ments of  Nature  —  chemistry,  vegetation,  the  animal 
life  —  exhibits  the  same  laws  on  a  different  plane  ; 
that  the  intellectual  and  moral  worlds  are  analogous 
to  the  material.  There  is  a  kind  of  latent  omnis- 
cience not  only  in  every  man  but  in  every  particle. 
That  convertibility  we  so  admire  in  plants  and  an- 
imal structures,  whereby  the  repairs  and  the  ulte- 
rior uses  are  subserved,  when  one  part  is  wounded 
or  deficient,  by  another  ;  this  self-help  and  self -cre- 
ation proceed  from  the  same  original  power  which 
works  remotely  in  grandest  and  meanest  structures 
by  the  same  design,  —  works  in  a  lobster  or  a  mite- 
worm  as  a  wise  man  would  if  imprisoned  in  that 
poor  form.  'T  is  the  effort  of  God,  of  the  Supreme 
Intellect,  in  the  extremest  frontier  of  his  universe. 

1  Reprinted  from  the  North  American  Review,  of  May,  1878. 


178  THE  SOVEREIGNTY  OF  ETHICS. 

As  this  unity  exists  in  the  organization  of  insect, 
beast  and  bird,  still  ascending  to  man,  and  from 
lower  type  of  man  to  the  highest  yet  attained,  so  it 
does  not  less  declare  itself  in  the  spirit  or  intelli- 
gence of  the  brute.  In  ignorant  ages  it  was  com- 
mon to  vaunt  the  human  superiority  by  underrating 
the  instinct  of  other  animals  ;  but  a  better  discern- 
ment finds  that  the  difference  is  only  of  less  and 
more.  Experiment  shows  that  the  bird  and  the 
dog  reason  as  the  hunter  does,  that  all  the  animals 
show  the  same  good  sense  in  their  humble  walk  that 
the  man  who  is  their  enemy  or  friend  does ;  and,  if 
it  be  in  smaller  measure,  yet  it  is  not  diminished, 
as  his  often  is,  by  freak  and  folly.  St.  Pierre  says 
of  the  animals  that  a  moral  sentiment  seems  to 
have  determined  their  physical  organization. 

I  see  the  unity  of  thought  and  of  morals  running 
through  all  animated  Nature  ;  there  is  no  difference 
of  quality,  but  only  of  more  and  less.  The  animal 
who  is  wholly  kept  down  in  Nature  has  no  anxieties. 
By  yielding,  as  he  must  do,  to  it,  he  is  enlarged  and 
reaches  his  highest  point.  The  poor  grub,  in  the 
hole  of  a  tree,  by  yielding  itself  to  Nature,  goes 
blameless  through  its  low  part  and  is  rewarded  at 
last,  casts  its  filthy  hull,  expands  into  a  beautiful 
form  with  rainbow  wings,  and  makes  a  part  of  the 
summer  day.  The  Greeks  called  it  Psyche,  a  man- 
ifest emblem  of  the  soul.     The  man  down  in  Nature 


THE  SOVEREIGNTY  OF  ETHICS.  179 

occupies  himself  in  guarding,  in  feeding,  in  warming 
and  multiplying  his  body,  and,  as  long  as  he  knows 
no  more,  we  justify  him  ;  but  presently  a  mystic 
change  is  wrought,  a  new  perception  opens,  and  he 
is  made  a  citizen  of  the  world  of  souls :  he  feels 
what  is  called  duty;  he  is  aware  that  he  owes  a 
higher  allegiance  to  do  and  live  as  a  good  member 
of  this  universe.  In  the  measure  in  which  he  has 
this  sense  he  is  a  man,  rises  to  the  universal  life. 
The  high  intellect  is  absolutely  at  one  with  moral 
nature.  A  thought  is  imbosomed  in  a  sentiment, 
and  the  attempt  to  detach  and  blazon  the  thought 
is  like  a  show  of  cut  flowers.  The  moral  is  the 
measure  of  health,  and  in  the  voice  of  Genius  I  hear 
invariably  the  moral  tone,  even  when  it  is  disowned 
in  words ;  —  health,  melody  and  a  wider  horizon  be- 
long to  moral  sensibility.  The  finer  the  sense  of 
justice,  the  better  poet.  The  believer  says  to  the 
skeptic :  — 

"  One  avenue  was  shaded  from  thine  eyes 
Through  which  I  wandered  to  eternal  truth." 

Humility  is  the  avenue.  To  be  sure,  we  exaggerate 
when  we  represent  these  two  elements  as  disunited  ; 
every  man  shares  them  both  ;  but  it  is  true  that  men 
generally  are  marked  by  a  decided  predominance 
of  one  or  of  the  other  element. 

In  youth  and  in  age  we  are  moralists,  and  in  ma- 


180  THE  SOVEREIGNTY  OF  ETHICS. 

ture  life  the  moral  element  steadily  rises  in  the  re- 
gard of  all  reasonable  men. 

'Tisa  sort  of  proverbial  dying  speech  of  scholars 
(at  least  it  is  attributed  to  many)  that  which  An- 
thony Wood  reports  of  Nathaniel  Carpenter,  an 
Oxford  Fellow.  "  It  did  repent  him,"  he  said, 
"  that  he  had  formerly  so  much  courted  the  maid 
instead  of  the  mistress,"  (meaning  philosophy  and 
mathematics  to  the  neglect  of  divinity).  This,  in 
the  language  of  our  time,  would  be  ethics. 

And  when  I  say  that  the  world  is  made  up  of 
moral  forces,  these  are  not  separate.  All  forces  are 
found  in  Nature  united  with  that  which  they  move  : 
heat  is  not  separate,  light  is  not  massed  aloof,  nor 
electricity,  nor  gravity,  but  they  are  always  in  com- 
bination. And  so  moral  powers ;  they  are  thirsts 
for  action,  and  the  more  you  accumulate,  the  more 
they  mould  and  form. 

It  is  in  the  stomach  of  plants  that  development 
begins,  and  ends  in  the  circles  of  the  universe.  'Tis 
a  long  scale  from  the  gorilla  to  the  gentleman  — 
from  the  gorilla  to  Plato,  Newton,  Shakspeare  —  to 
the  sanctities  of  religion,  the  refinements  of  legisla- 
tion, the  summits  of  science,  art  and  poetry.  The 
beginnings  are  slow  and  infirm,  but  it  is  an  always- 
accelerated  march.  The  geologic  world  is  chroni- 
cled by  the  growing  ripeness  of  the  strata  from  lower 
to  higher,  as  it  becomes  the  abode  of  more  highly- 


THE  SOVEREIGNTY  OF  ETHICS.  181 

organized  plants  and  animals.  The  civil  history  of 
men  might  be  traced  by  the  successive  meliorations 
as  marked  in  higher  moral  generalizations ;  —  virtue 
meaning  physical  courage,  then  chastity  and  tem- 
perance, then  justice  and  love  ;  — bargains  of  kings 
with  peoples  of  certain  rights  to  certain  classes, 
then  of  rights  to  masses,  —  then  at  last  came  the 
day  when,  as  the  historians  rightly  tell,  the  nerves 
of  the  world  were  electrified  by  the  proclamation 
that  all  men  are  born  free  and  equal. 

Every  truth  leads  in  another.  The  bud  extrudes 
the  old  leaf,  and  every  truth  brings  that  which  will 
supplant  it.  In  the  court  of  law  the  judge  sits  over 
the  culprit,  but  in  the  court  of  life  in  the  same  hour 
the  judge  also  stands  as  culprit  before  a  true  tribu- 
nal. Every  judge  is  a  culprit,  every  law  an  abuse. 
Montaigne  kills  off  bigots  as  cowhage  kills  worms  ; 
but  there  is  a  higher  muse  there  sitting  where  he 
durst  not  soar,  of  eye  so  keen  that  it  can  report  of 
a  realm  in  which  all  the  wit  and  learning  of  the 
Frenchman  is  no  more  than  the  cunning  of  a  fox. 

It  is  the  same  fact  existing  as  sentiment  and  as 
will  in  the  mind,  which  works  in  Nature  as  irresist- 
ible law,  exerting  influence  over  nations,  intelligent 
beings,  or  down  in  the  kingdoms  of  brute  or  of 
chemical  atoms.  Nature  is  a  tropical  swamp  in  sun- 
shine, on  whose  purlieus  we  hear  the  song  of  sum- 
mer birds,  and  see  prismatic  dew-drops  —  but  her 


182  THE  SOVEREIGNTY  OF  ETHICS. 

interiors  are  terrific,  full  of  hydras  and  crocodiles. 
In  the  pre-adamite  she  bred  valor  only  ;  by-and-by 
she  gets  on  to  man,  and  adds  tenderness,  and  thus 
raises  virtue  piecemeal. 

When  we  trace  from  the  beginning,  that  ferocity 
has  uses  ;  only  so  are  the  conditions  of  the  then 
world  met,  and  these  monsters  are  the  scavengers, 
executioners,  diggers,  pioneers  and  fertilizers,  de- 
stroying what  is  more  destructive  than  they,  and 
making  better  life  possible.  We  see  the  steady 
aim  of  Benefit  in  view  from  the  first.  Melioration 
is  the  law.  The  crudest  foe  is  a  masked  benefactor. 
The  wars  which  make  history  so  dreary,  have 
served  the  cause  of  truth  and  virtue.  There  is  al- 
ways an  instinctive  sense  of  right,  an  obscure  idea 
which  animates  either  party  and  which  in  long 
periods  vindicates  itself  at  last.  Thus  a  sublime 
confidence  is  fed  at  the  bottom  of  the  heart  that,  in 
spite  of  appearances,  in  spite  of  malignity  and  blind 
self-interest  living  for  the  moment,  an  eternal,  be- 
neficent necessity  is  always  bringing  things  right ; 
and,  though  we  should  fold  our  arms,  —  which  we 
cannot  do,  for  our  duty  requires  us  to  be  the  very 
hands  of  this  guiding  sentiment,  and  work  in  the 
present  moment,  —  the  evils  we  suffer  will  at  last 
end  themselves  through  the  incessant  op2Dosition  of 
Nature  to  everything  hurtful. 

The  excellence  of  men  consists  in  the  complete- 


THE  SOVEREIGNTY  OF  ETHICS.  183 

ness  with  which  the  lower  system  is  taken  up  into 
the  higher  —  a  process  of  much  time  and  delicacy, 
but  in  which  no  point  of  the  lower  should  be  left 
untranslated ;  so  that  the  warfare  of  beasts  should 
be  renewed  in  a  finer  field,  for  more  excellent  vic- 
tories. Savage  war  gives  place  to  that  of  Turenne 
and  Wellington,  which  has  limitations  and  a  code. 
This  war  again  gives  place  to  the  finer  quarrel  of 
property,  where  the  victory  is  wealth  and  the 
defeat  poverty. 

The  inevitabilities  are  always  sapping  every 
seeming  prosperity  built  on  a  wrong.  No  matter 
how  you  seem  to  fatten  on  a  crime,  that  can  never 
be  good  for  the  bee  which  is  bad  for  the  hive.  See 
how  these  things  look  in  the  page  of  history.  Na- 
tions come  and  go,  cities  rise  and  fall,  all  the  in- 
stincts of  man,  good  and  bad,  work,  —  and  every 
wish,  appetite,  and  passion,  rushes  into  act  and  em- 
bodies itself  in  usages,  protects  itself  with  laws. 
Some  of  them  are  usef  id  and  universally  acceptable, 
hinder  none,  help  all,  and  these  are  honored  and 
perpetuated.  Others  are  noxious.  Community  of 
property  is  tried,  as  when  a  Tartar  horde  or  an  In- 
dian tribe  roam  over  a  vast  tract  for  pasturage  or 
hunting  ;  but  it  is  found  at  last  that  some  establish- 
ment of  property,  allowing  each  on  some  distinct 
terms  to  fence  and  cultivate  a  piece  of  land,  is  best 
for  all. 


184  THE  SOVEREIGNTY  OF  ETHICS. 

"  For  my  part,"  said  Napoleon,  "  it  is  not  the 
mystery  of  the  incarnation  which  1  discover  in  relig- 
ion, but  the  mystery  of  social  order,  which  associ- 
ates with  heaven  that  idea  of  equality  which  pre- 
vents the  rich  from  destroying  the  poor." 

Shall  I  say  then  it  were  truer  to  see  Necessity 
calm,  beautiful,  passionless,  without  a  smile,  covered 
with  ensigns  of  woe,  stretching  her  dark  warp 
across  the  universe  ?  These  threads  are  Nature's 
pernicious  elements,  her  deluges,  miasma,  disease, 
poison  ;  her  curdling  cold,  her  hideous  reptiles  and 
worse  men,  cannibals,  and  the  depravities  of  civil- 
ization; the  secrets  of  the  prisons  of  tyranny,  the 
slave  and  his  master,  the  proud  man's  scorn,  the 
orphan's  tears,  the  vices  of  men,  lust,  cruelty  and 
pitiless  avarice.  These  make  the  gloomy  warp  of 
ages.  Humanity  sits  at  the  dread  loom  and  throws 
the  shuttle  and  fills  it  with  joyful  rainbows,  until 
the  sable  ground  is  flowered  all  over  with  a  woof 
of  human  industry  and  wisdom,  virtuous  examples, 
symbols  of  useful  and  generous  arts,  with  beauty 
and  pure  love,  courage  and  the  victories  of  the  just 
and  wise  over  malice  and  wrong. 

Nature  is  not  so  helpless  but  it  can  rid  itself  at 
last  of  every  crime.  An  Eastern  poet,  in  describ- 
ing the  golden  age,  said  that  God  had  made  justice 
so  dear  to  the  heart  of  Nature  that,  if  any  injustice 
lurked  anywhere  under    the    sky,    the  blue  vault 


THE  SOVEREIGNTY  OF  ETHICS.  185 

would  shrivel  to  a  snake-skin  and  cast  it  out  by- 
spasms.  But  the  spasms  of  Nature  are  years  and 
centuries,  and  it  will  tax  the  faith  of  man  to  wait 
so  long. 

Man  is  always  throwing  his  praise  or  blame  on 
events,  and  does  not  see  that  he  only  is  real,  and 
the  world  his  mirror  and  echo.  He  imputes  the 
stroke  to  fortune,  which  in  reality  himself  strikes. 
The  student  discovers  one  clay  that  he  lives  in  en- 
chantment :  the  house,  the  works,  the  persons,  the 
days,  the  weathers  —  all  that  he  calls  Nature,  all 
that  he  calls  institutions,  when  once  his  mind  is 
active  are  visions  merely,  wonderful  allegories, 
significant  pictures  of  the  laws  of  the  mind;  and 
through  this  enchanted  gallery  he  is  led  by  unseen 
guides  to  read  and  learn  the  laws  of  Heaven.  This 
discovery  may  come  early,  —  sometimes  in  the 
nursery,  to  a  rare  child ;  later  in  the  school,  but 
oftener  when  the  mind  is  more  mature  ;  and  to 
multitudes  of  men  wanting  in  mental  activity  it 
never  comes  —  any  more  than  poetry  or  art.  But 
it  ought  to  come  ;  it  belongs  to  the  human  intellect, 
and  is  an  insight  which  we  cannot  spare. 

The  idea  of  right  exists  in  the  human  mind,  and 
lays  itself  out  in  the  equilibrium  of  Nature,  in  the 
equalities  and  periods  of  our  system,  in  the  level  of 
seas,  in  the  action  and  reaction  of  forces.  Nothing 
is  allowed  to  exceed  or  absorb  the  rest ;  if  it  do, 


186  THE  SOVEREIGNTY  OF  ETHICS. 

it  is  disease,  and  is  quickly  destroyed.  It  was  an 
early  discovery  of  the  mind,  —  this  beneficent  rule. 
Strength  enters  just  as  much  as  the  moral  element 
prevails.  The  strength  of  the  animal  to  eat  and  to 
be  luxurious  and  to  usurp  is  rudeness  and  imbecil- 
ity. The  law  is :  To  each  shall  be  rendered  his 
own.  As  thou  sowest,  thou  shalt  reap.  Smite, 
and  thou  shalt  smart.  Serve,  and  thou  shalt  be 
served.  If  you  love  and  serve  men,  you  cannot, 
by  any  hiding  or  stratagem,  escape  the  remunera- 
tion. Secret  retributions  are  always  restoring  the 
level,  when  disturbed,  of  the  Divine  justice.  It  is 
impossible  to  tilt  the  beam.  All  the  tyrants  and 
proprietors  and  monopolists  of  the  world  in  vain 
set  their  shoulders  to  heave  the  bar.  Settles  for 
evermore  the  ponderous  equator  to  its  line,  and 
man  and  mote  and  star  and  sun  must  range  with 
it,  or  be  pulverized  by  the  recoil. 

It  is  a  doctrine  of  unspeakable  comfort.  He  that 
plants  his  foot  here,  passes  at  once  out  of  the  king- 
dom of  illusions.  Others  may  well  suffer  in  the 
hideous  picture  of  crime  with  which  earth  is  filled 
and  the  life  of  society  threatened,  but  the  habit  of 
respecting  that  great  order  which  certainly  contains 
and  will  dispose  of  our  little  system,  will  take  all 
fear  from  the  heart.  It  did  itself  create  and  dis- 
tribute all  that  is  created  and  distributed,  and, 
trusting  to  its  power,  we  cease  to  care  for  what  it 


THE  SOVEREIGNTY  OF  ETHICS.  18? 

will  certainly  order  well.  To  good  men,  as  we  call 
good  men,  this  doctrine  of  Trust  is  an  unsounded 
secret.  They  use  the  word,  they  have  accepted  the 
notion  of  a  mechanical  supervision  of  human  life, 
by  which  that  certain  wonderful  being  whom  they 
call  God  does  take  up  their  affairs  where  their  intel- 
ligence leaves  them,  and  somehow  knits  and  co-ordi- 
nates the  issues  of  them  in  all  that  is  beyond  the 
reach  of  private  faculty.  They  do  not  see  that  He, 
that  It,  is  there,  next  and  within ;  the  thought  of  the 
thought ;  the  affair  of  affairs ;  that  he  is  existence, 
and  take  him  from  them  and  they  would  not  be. 
They  do  not  see  that  particulars  are  sacred  to  him, 
as  well  as  the  scope  and  outline  ;  that  these  passages 
of  daily  life  are  his  work ;  that  in  the  moment  when 
they  desist  from  interference,  these  particulars  take 
sweetness  and  grandeur,  and  become  the  language 
of  mighty  principles. 

A  man  should  be  a  guest  in  his  own  house,  and 
a  guest  in  his  own  thought.  He  is  there  to  speak 
for  truth ;  but  who  is  he  ?  Some  clod  the  truth 
has  snatched  from  the  ground,  and  with  fire  has 
fashioned  to  a  momentary  man.  Without  the  truth, 
he  is  a  clod  again.  Let  him  find  his  superiority  in 
not  wishing  superiority ;  find  the  riches  of  love 
which  possesses  that  which  it  adores  ;  the  riches  of 
poverty ;  the  height  of  lowliness,  the  immensity  of 
to-day ;  and,  in  the  passing  hour,  the  age  of  ages. 


188  THE  SOVEREIGNTY  OF  ETHICS. 

Wondrous  state  of  man !  never  so  happy  as  when 
he  has  lost  all  private  interests  and  regards,  and 
exists  only  in  obedience  and  love  of  the  Author. 

The  fiery  soul  said  :  "  Let  me  be  a  blot  on  this 
fair  world,  the  obscurest,  the  loneliest  sufferer,  with 
one  proviso,  — that  I  know  it  is  His  agency.  I  will 
love  him,  though  he  shed  frost  and  darkness  on 
every  way  of  mine."  The  emphasis  of  that  blessed 
doctrine  lay  in  lowliness.  The  new  saint  gloried 
in  infirmities.  Who  or  what  was  he  ?  His  rise 
and  his  recovery  were  vicarious.  He  has  fallen  in 
another ;  he  rises  in  another. 

We  perish,  and  perish  gladly,  if  the  law  remains. 
I  hope  it  is  conceivable  that  a  man  may  go  to  ruin 
gladly,  if  he  see  that  thereby  no  shade  falls  on  that 
he  loves  and  adores.  We  need  not  always  be  stip- 
ulating for  our  clean  shirt  and  roast  joint  per  diem. 
We  do  not  believe  the  less  in  astronomy  and  vege- 
tation, because  we  are  writhing  and  roaring  in  our 
beds  with  rheumatism.  Cripples  and  invalids,  we 
doubt  not  there  are  bounding  fawns  in  the  forest, 
and  lilies  with  graceful,  springing  stem  ;  so  neither 
do  we  doubt  or  fail  to  love  the  eternal  law,  of  which 
we  are  such  shabby  practisers.  Truth  gathers  itself 
spotless  and  unhurt  after  all  our  surrenders  and 
concealments  and  partisanship  —  never  hurt  by  the 
treachery  or  ruin  of  its  best  defenders,  whether 
Luther,  or  William  Penn,  or  St.  Paul.     We  an* 


TEE  SOVEREIGNTY  OF  ETHICS.  189 

swer,  when  they  tell  us  of  the  bad  behavior  of  Lu- 
ther or  Paul :  "  Well,  what  if  he  did  ?  Who  was 
more  pained  than  Luther  or  Paul  ?  "  Shall  we  at- 
tach ourselves  violently  to  our  teachers  and  histor- 
ical personalities,  and  think  the  foundation  shaken 
if  any  fault  is  shown  in  their  record?  But  how  is 
the  truth  hurt  by  their  falling  from  it  ?  The  law 
of  gravity  is  not  hurt  by  every  accident,  though 
our  leg  be  broken.  No  more  is  the  law  of  justice 
by  our  departure  from  it. 

We  are  to  know  that  we  are  never  without  a  pi- 
lot. When  we  know  not  how  to  steer,  and  dare 
not  hoist  a  sail,  we  can  drift.  The  current  knows 
the  way,  though  we  do  not.  When  the  stars  and 
sun  appear,  when  we  have  conversed  with  naviga- 
tors who  know  the  coast,  we  may  begin  to  put  out 
an  oar  and  trim  a  sail.  The  ship  of  heaven  guides 
itself,  and  will  not  accept  a  wooden  rudder. 

Have  you  said  to  yourself  ever :  '  I  abdicate  all 
choice,  I  see  it  is  not  for  me  to  interfere.  I  see 
that  I  have  been  one  of  the  crowd;  that  I  have 
been  a  pitifid  person,  because  I  have  wished  to  be 
my  own  master,  and  to  dress  and  order  my  whole 
way  and  system  of  living.  I  thought  I  managed 
it  very  well.  I  see  that  my  neighbors  think  so.  I 
have  heard  prayers,  I  have  prayed  even,  but  I  have 
never  until  now  dreamed  that  this  undertaking  the 
entire  management  of  my  own  affairs  was  not  com- 


190  THE  SOVEREIGNTY  OF  ETHICS. 

mendable.  I  have  never  seen,  until  now,  that  it 
dwarfed  me.  I  have  not  discovered,  until  this 
blessed  ray  flashed  just  now  through  my  soul,  that 
there  dwelt  any  power  in  Nature  that  would  relieve 
me  of  my  load.     But  now  I  see.' 

What  is  this  intoxicating  sentiment  that  allies 
this  scrap  of  dust  to  the  whole  of  Nature  and  the 
whole  of  Fate,  —  that  makes  this  doll  a  dweller  in 
ages,  mocker  at  time,  able  to  spurn  all  outward  ad- 
vantages, peer  and  master  of  the  elements  ?  I  am 
taught  by  it  that  what  touches  any  thread  in  the 
vast  web  of  being  touches  me.  I  am  representative 
of  the  whole ;  and  the  good  of  the  whole,  or  what  I 
call  the  right,  makes  me  invulnerable. 

How  came  this  creation  so  magically  woven  that 
nothing  can  do  me  mischief  but  myself,  —  that  an 
invisible  fence  surrounds  my  being  which  screens 
me  from  all  harm  that  I  will  to  resist  ?  If  I  will 
stand  upright,  the  creation  cannot  bend  me.  But 
if  I  violate  myself,  if  I  commit  a  crime,  the  light- 
ning loiters  by  the  speed  of  retribution,  and  every 
act  is  not  hereafter  but  instantaneously  rewarded 
according  to  its  quality.  Virtue  is  the  adopting  of 
this  dictate  of  the  universal  mind  by  the  individual 
will.  Character  is  the  habit  of  this  obedience,  and 
Religion  is  the  accompanying  emotion,  the  emotion 
of  reverence  which  frhe  presence  of  the  universal 
mind  ever  excites  in  the  individual. 


THE  SOVEREIGNTY  OF  ETHICS.  191 

We  go  to  famous  books  for  our  examples  of 
character,  just  as  we  send  to  England  for  shrubs 
which  grow  as  well  in  our  own  door-yards  and  cow- 
pastures.  Life  is  always  rich,  and  spontaneous 
graces  and  forces  elevate  it  in  every  domestic  cir- 
cle, which  are  overlooked  while  we  are  reading 
something  less  excellent  in  old  authors.  From  the 
obscurity  and  casualty  of  those  which  I  know,  I  in- 
fer the  obscurity  and  casualty  of  the  like  balm  and 
consolation  and  immortality  in  a  thousand  homes 
which  I  do  not  know,  all  round  the  world.  And  I 
see  not  why  to  these  simple  instincts,  simple  yet 
grand,  all  the  heights  and  transcendencies  of  virtue 
and  of  enthusiasm  are  not  open.  There  is  power 
enough  in  them  to  move  the  world ;  and  it  is  not 
any  sterility  or  defect  in  ethics,  but  our  negligence 
of  these  fine  monitors,  of  these  world-embracing 
sentiments,  that  makes  religion  cold  and  life  low. 

While  the  immense  energy  of  the  sentiment  of 
duty  and  the  awe  of  the  supernatural  exert  incom- 
parable influence  on  the  mind,  —  yet  it  is  often  per- 
verted, and  the  tradition  received  with  awe,  but 
without  correspondent  action  of  the  receiver.  Then 
you  find  so  many  men  infatuated  on  that  topic ! 
Wise  on  all  other,  they  lose  their  head  the  moment 
they  talk  of  religion.  It  is  the  sturdiest  prejudice 
in  the  public  mind  that  religion  is  something  by 
itself ;  a  department  distinct  from  all  other  experi 


192  THE  SOVEREIGNTY  OF  ETHICS. 

ences,  and  to  which  the  tests  and  judgment  men 
are  ready  enough  to  show  on  other  things,  do  not 
apply.  You  may  sometimes  talk  with  the  gravest 
and  best  citizen,  and  the  moment  the  topic  of  re- 
ligion is  broached,  he  runs  into  a  childish  supersti- 
tion. His  face  looks  infatuated,  and  his  conversa- 
tion is.  When  I  talked  with  an  ardent  missionary, 
and  pointed  out  to  him  that  his  creed  found  no 
support  in  my  experience,  he  replied,  "It  is  not  so 
in  your  experience,  but  is  so  in  the  other  world." 
I  answer :  Other  world !  there  is  no  other  world. 
God  is  one  and  omnipresent ;  here  or  nowhere  is 
the  whole  fact.  The  one  miracle  which  God  works 
evermore  is  in  Nature,  and  imparting  himself  to 
the  mind.  When  we  ask  simply,  "  What  is  true 
in  thought  ?  what  is  just  in  action  ?  "  it  is  the  yield- 
ing of  the  private  heart  to  the  Divine  mind,  and 
all  personal  preferences,  and  all  requiring  of  won- 
ders, are  profane. 

The  word  miracle,  as  it  is  used,  only  indicates  the 
ignorance  of  the  devotee,  staring  with  wonder  to 
see  water  turned  into  wine,  and  heedless  of  the  stu- 
pendous fact  of  his  own  personality.  Here  he 
stands,  a  lonely  thought  harmoniously  organized 
into  correspondence  with  the  universe  of  mind  and 
matter.  What  narrative  of  wonders  coming  down 
from  a  thousand  years  ought  to  charm  his  attention 
like  this  ?     Certainly  it  is  human  to  value  a  genera] 


THE  SOVEREIGNTY  OF  ETHICS.  193 

consent,  a  fraternity  of  believers,  a  crowded  church  ; 
but  as  the  sentiment  purifies  and  rises,  it  leaves 
crowds.  It  makes  churches  of  two,  churches  of 
one.  A  fatal  disservice  does  this  Swedenborg  or 
other  who  offers  to  do  my  thinking"  for  me.  It 
seems  as  if,  when  the  Spirit  of  God  speaks  so 
plainly  to  each  soul,  it  were  an  impiety  to  be  listen- 
ing to  one  or  another  saint.  Jesus  was  better  than 
others,  because  he  refused  to  listen  to  others  and 
listened  at  home. 

You  are  really  interested  in  your  thought.  You 
have  meditated  in  silent  wonder  on  your  existence 
in  this  world.  You  have  perceived  in  the  first  fact 
of  your  conscious  life  here  a  miracle  so  astound- 
ing, —  a  miracle  comprehending  all  the  universe  of 
miracles  to  which  your  intelligent  life  gives  you  ac- 
cess, —  as  to  exhaust  wonder,  and  leave  you  no 
need  of  hunting  here  or  there  for  any  particular 
exhibitions  of  power.  Then  up  comes  a  man  with 
a  text  of  1  John  v.  7,  or  a  knotty  sentence  from  St. 
Paul,  which  he  considers  as  the  axe  at  the  root  of 
your  tree.  You  cannot  bring  yourself  to  care  for 
it.  You  say :  "  Cut  away  ;  my  tree  is  Ygdrasil  — 
the  tree  of  life."  He  interrupts  for  the  moment 
your  peaceful  trust  in  the  Divine  Providence.  Let 
him  know  by  your  security  that  your  conviction  is 
clear  and  sufficient,  and  if  he  were  Paul  himself, 
you  also  are  here,  and  with  your  Creator. 


194  THE  SOVEREIGNTY  OF  ETHICS. 

We  all  give  way  to  superstitions.  The  house  in 
which  we  were  born  is  not  quite  mere  timber  and 
stone  ;  is  still  haunted  by  parents  and  progenitors. 
The  creeds  into  which  we  were  initiated  in  child- 
hood and  youth  no  longer  hold  their  old  place  in 
the  minds  of  thoughtful  men,  but  they  are  not  notho 
ing  to  us,  and  we  hate  to  have  them  treated  with 
contempt.  There  is  so  much  that  we  do  not  know, 
that  we  give  to  these  suggestions  the  benefit  of  the 
doubt. 

It  is  a  necessity  of  the  human  mind  that  he  who 
looks  at  one  object  should  look  away  from  all  other 
objects.  He  may  throw  himself  upon  some  sharp 
statement  of  one  fact,  some  verbal  creed,  with  such 
concentration  as  to  hide  the  universe  from  him :  but 
the  stars  roll  above ;  the  sun  warms  him.  With 
patience  and  fidelity  to  truth  he  may  work  his  way 
through,  if  only  by  coming  against  somebody  who 
believes  more  fables  than  he  does ;  and,  in  trying 
to  dispel  the  illusions  of  his  neighbor,  he  opens  his 
own  eyes. 

In  the  Christianity  of  this  country  there  is  wide 
difference  of  opinion  in  regard  to  inspiration,  proph- 
ecy, miracles,  the  future  state  of  the  soul ;  every 
variety  of  opinion,  and  rapid  revolution  in  opinions, 
in  the  last  half -century.  It  is  simply  impossible  to 
read  the  old  history  of  the  first  century  as  it  was 
read  in  the  ninth ;  to  do  so  you  must  abolish  in 


THE  SOVEREIGNTY  OF  ETHICS.  195 

your  mind  the  lessons  of  all  the  centuries  from  the 
ninth  to  the  nineteenth. 

Shall  I  make  the  mistake  of  baptizing  the  clay- 
light,  and  time,  and  space,  by  the  name  of  John  or 
Joshua,  in  whose  tent  I  chance  to  behold  daylight, 
and  space,  and  time?  What  anthropomorphists 
we  are  in  this,  that  we  cannot  let  moral  distinctions 
be,  but  must  mould  them  into  human  shape ! 
"  Mere  morality  "  means,  —  not  put  into  a  personal 
master  of  morals.  Our  religion  is  geographical, 
belongs  to  our  time  and  place ;  respects  and  my- 
thologizes  some  one  time  and  place  and  person  and 
people.  So  it  is  occasional.  It  visits  us  only  on 
some  exceptional  and  ceremonial  occasion,  on  a 
wedding  or  a  baptism,  on  a  sick-bed,  or  at  a  fu- 
neral, or  perhaps  on  a  sublime  national  victory  or  a 
peace.  But  that  be  sure  is  not  the  religion  of  the 
universal  unsleeping  providence,  which  lurks  in 
trifles,  in  still,  small  voices,  in  the  secrets  of  the 
heart  and  our  closest  thoughts,  as  efficiently  as  in 
our  proclamations  and  successes. 

Far  be  it  from  me  to  underrate  the  men  or  the 
churches  that  have  fixed  the  hearts  of  men  and  or- 
ganized their  devout  impulses  or  oracles  into  good 
institutions.  The  Church  of  Rome  had  its  saints, 
and  inspired  the  conscience  of  Europe  —  St.  Au- 
gustine, and  Thomas  a  Kempis,  and  Fenelon  ;  the 
piety  of  the  English  Church  in  Cranmer,  and  Her- 


196  THE  SOVEREIGNTY  OF  ETHICS. 

bert,  and  Taylor  ;  the  Keformed  Church,  Scougal  -, 
the  mystics,  Behmen  and  Swedenborg;  the  Qua- 
kers, Fox  and  James  Naylor.  I  confess  our  later 
generation  appears  ungirt,  frivolous,  compared  with 
the  religions  of  the  last  or  Calvinistic  age.  There 
was  in  the  last  century  a  serious  habitual  reference 
to  the  spiritual  world,  running  through  diaries,  let- 
ters and  conversation  —  yes,  and  into  wills  and  le- 
gal instruments  also,  compared  with  which  our  lib- 
eration looks  a  little  foppish  and  dapper. 

The  religion  of  seventy  years  ago  was  an  iron 
belt  to  the  mind,  giving  it  concentration  and  force. 
A  rude  people  were  kept  respectable  by  the  deter- 
mination of  thought  on  the  eternal  world.  Now 
men  fall  abroad,  —  want  polarity,  —  suffer  in  char- 
acter and  intellect.  A  sleep  creeps  over  the  great 
functions  of  man.  Enthusiasm  goes  out.  In  its 
stead  a  low  prudence  seeks  to  hold  society  staunch, 
but  its  arms  are  too  short,  cordage  and  machinery 
never  supply  the  place  of  life. 

Luther  would  cut  his  hand  off  sooner  than  write 
theses  against  the  pope  if  he  suspected  that  he  was 
bringing  on  with  all  his  might  the  pale  negations 
of  Boston  Unitarianism.  I  will  not  now  go  into 
the  metaphysics  of  that  reaction  by  which  in  history 
a  period  of  belief  is  followed  by  an  age  of  criticism, 
in  which  wit  takes  the  place  of  faith  in  the  leading 
spirits,  and  an  excessive  respect  for  forms  out  of 


THE  SOVEREIGNTY  OF  ETHICS.  197 

which  the  heart  has  departed  becomes  most  obvious 
in  the  least  religious  minds.  I  will  not  now  explore 
the  causes  of  the  result,  but  the  fact  must  be  con- 
ceded as  of  frequent  recurrence,  and  never  more 
evident  than  in  our  American  church.  To  a  self- 
denying,  ardent  church,  delighting  in  rites  and  or- 
dinances, has  succeeded  a  cold,  intellectual  race, 
who  analyze  the  prayer  and  psalm  of  their  forefa- 
thers, and  the  more  intellectual  reject  every  yoke 
of  authority  and  custom  with  a  petulance  unprece- 
dented. It  is  a  sort  of  mark  of  probity  and  sincer- 
ity to  declare  how  little  you  believe,  while  the  mass 
of  the  community  indolently  follow  the  old  forms 
with  childish  scrupulosity,  and  we  have  punctuality 
for  faith,  and  good  taste  for  character. 

But  I  hope  the  defect  of  faith  with  us  is  only 
apparent.  We  shall  find  that  freedom  has  its  own 
guards,  and,  as  soon  as  in  the  vulgar  it  runs  to  li- 
cense, sets  all  reasonable  men  on  exploring  those 
guards.  I  do  not  think  the  summit  of  this  age 
truly  reached  or  expressed  unless  it  attain  the 
height  which  religion  and  philosophy  reached  in 
any  former  age.  If  I  miss  the  inspiration  of  the 
saints  of  Calvinism,  or  of  Platonism,  or  Buddhism, 
our  times  are  not  up  to  theirs,  or,  more  truly,  have 
not  yet  their  own  legitimate  force. 

Worship  is  the  regard  for  what  is  above  us. 
Men  are  respectable  only  as  they  respect.     We  de- 


198  THE  SOVEREIGNTY  OF  ETHICS. 

light  in  children  because  of  that  religious  eye  which 
belongs  to  them ;  because  of  their  reverence  for 
their  seniors,  and  for  their  objects  of  belief.  The 
poor  Irish  laborer  one  sees  with  respect,  because  he 
believes  in  something,  in  his  church,  and  in  his  em- 
ployers. Superstitious  persons  we  see  with  respect, 
because  their  whole  existence  is  not  bounded  by 
their  hats  and  their  shoes,  but  they  walk  attended 
by  pictures  of  the  imagination,  to  which  they  pay 
homage.  You  cannot  impoverish  man  by  taking 
away  these  objects  above  him  without  ruin.  It  is 
very  sad  to  see  men  who  think  their  goodness  made 
of  themselves  ;  it  is  very  grateful  to  see  those  who 
hold  an  opinion  the  reverse  of  this. 

All  ages  of  belief  have  been  great ;  all  of  unbe- 
lief have  been  mean.  The  Orientals  believe  in 
Fate.  That  which  shall  befall  them  is  written  on 
the  iron  leaf ;  they  will  not  turn  on  their  heel  to 
avoid  famine,  plague,  or  the  sword  of  the  enemy. 
That  is  great,  and  gives  a  great  air  to  the  people. 
We  in  America  are  charged  with  a  great  deficiency 
in  worship  ;  that  reverence  does  not  belong  to  our 
character ;  that  our  institutions,  our  politics,  and 
our  trade,  have  fostered  a  self-reliance  which  is 
small,  liliputian,  full  of  fuss  and  bustle ;  we  look 
at  and  will  bear  nothing  above  us  in  the  state,  and 
do  exceedingly  applaud  and  admire  ourselves,  and 
believe  in  our  senses  and  understandings,  while  our 


THE  SOVEREIGNTY  OF  ETHICS. 


199 


imagination  and  our  moral  sentiment  are  desolated. 
In  religion  too  we  want  objects  above ;  we  are  fast 
losing  or  have  already  lost  our  old  reverence  ;  new 
views  of  inspiration,  of  miracles,  of  the  saints,  have 
supplanted  the  old  opinions,  and  it  is  vain  to  bring 
them  again.  Revolutions  never  go  backward,  and 
in  all  churches  a  certain  decay  of  ancient  piety  is 
lamented,  and  all  threatens  to  lapse  into  apathy 
and  indifferentism.  It  becomes  us  to  consider 
whether  we  cannot  have  a  real  faith  and  real  ob- 
jects in  lieu  of  these  false  ones.  The  human  mind, 
when  it  is  trusted,  is  never  false  to  itself.  If  there 
be  sincerity  and  good  meaning  —  if  there  be  really 
in  us  the  wish  to  seek  for  our  superiors,  for  that 
which  is  lawfully  above  us,  we  shall  not  long  look 
in  vain. 

Meantime  there  is  great  centrality,  a  centripe- 
tence  equal  to  the  centrifugence.  The  mystic  or  the- 
ist  is  never  scared  by  any  startling  materialism.  He 
knows  the  laws  of  gravitation  and  of  repulsion  are 
deaf  to  French  talkers,  be  they  never  so  witty.  If 
theology  shows  that  opinions  are  fast  changing,  it  is 
not  so  with  the  convictions  of  men  with  regard  to 
conduct.  These  remain.  The  most  daring  heroism, 
the  most  accomplished  culture,  or  rapt  holiness, 
never  exhausted  the  claim  of  these  lowly  duties,  — ■ 
never  penetrated  to  their  origin,  or  was  able  to  look 
behind  their   source.      We  cannot  disenchant,  we 


200  THE  SOVEREIGNTY  OF  ETHICS. 

cannot  impoverish  ourselves,  by  obedience ;  but  by 
humility  we  rise,  by  obedience  we  command,  by  pov- 
erty we  are  rich,  by  dying  we  live. 

We  are  thrown  back  on  rectitude  forever  and 
ever,  only  rectitude,  ■ —  to  mend  one  ;  that  is  all  we 
can  do.  But  that  the  zealot  stigmatizes  as  a  sterile 
chimney-corner  philosophy.  Now  the  first  position 
I  make  is  that  natural  religion  supplies  still  all  the 
facts  which  are  disguised  under  the  dogma  of  pop- 
ular creeds.  The  progress  of  religion  is  steadily  to 
its  identity  with  morals. 

How  is  the  new  generation  to  be  edified  ?  How 
should  it  not  ?  The  life  of  those  once  omnipotent 
traditions  was  really  not  in  the  legend,  but  hi  the 
moral  sentiment  and  the  metaphysical  fact  which 
the  legends  enclosed  —  and  these  survive.  A  new 
Socrates,  or  Zeno,  or  Swedenborg,  or  Pascal,  or  a 
new  crop  of  geniuses  like  those  of  the  Elizabethan 
age,  may  be  born  in  this  age,  and,  with  happy 
heart  and  a  bias  for  theism,  bring  asceticism,  duty, 
and  magnanimity  into  vogue  again. 

It  is  true  that  Stoicism,  always  attractive  to  the 
intellectual  and  cultivated,  has  now  no  temples,  no 
academy,  no  commanding  Zeno  or  Antoninus.  It 
.accuses  us  that  it  has  none  :  that  pure  ethics  is  not 
now  formulated  and  concreted  into  a  cultus,  a  fra- 
ternity with  assemblings  and  holy-days,  with  song 
and  book,  with  brick  and  stone.    Whj  have  not  those 


THE  SOVEREIGNTY  OF  ETHICS.  201 

who  believe  in  it  and  love  it  left  all  for  this,  and  ded- 
icated themselves  to  write  out  its  scientific  scriptures 
to  become  its  Vulgate  for  millions  ?  I  answer  for 
one  that  the  inspirations  we  catch  of  this  law  are 
not  continuous  and  technical,  but  joyful  sparkles, 
and  are  recorded  for  their  beauty,  for  the  delight 
they  give,  not  for  their  obligation ;  and  that  is  their 
priceless  good  to  men,  that  they  charm  and  uplift, 
not  that  they  are  imposed.  It  has  not  yet  its  first 
hymn.  But,  that  every  line  and  word  may  be  coals 
of  true  fire,  ages  must  roll,  ere  these  casual  wide- 
falling  cinders  can  be  gathered  into  broad  and 
steady  altar-flame. 

It  does  not  yet  appear  what  forms  the  religious 
feeling  will  take.  It  prepares  to  rise  out  of  all 
forms  to  an  absolute  justice  and  healthy  perception. 
Here  is  now  a  new  feeling  of  humanity  infused  into 
public  action.  Here  is  contribution  of  money  on  a 
more  extended  and  systematic  scale  than  ever  before 
to  repair  public  disasters  at  a  distance,  and  of  polit- 
ical support  to  oppressed  parties.  Then  there  are 
the  new  conventions  of  social  science,  before  which 
the  questions  of  the  rights  of  women,  the  laws  of 
trade,  the  treatment  of  crime,  regulation  of  labor, 
come  for  a  hearing.  If  these  are  tokens  of  the 
steady  currents  of  thought  and  will  in  these  direc- 
tions, one  might  well  anticipate  a  new  nation. 

I  know  how  delicate  this  principle  is,  —  how  dif- 


202  THE  SOVEREIGNTY  OF  ETHICS. 

ficult  of  adaptation  to  practical  and  social  arrange* 
ments.  It  cannot  be  profaned  ;  it  cannot  be  forced  ; 
to  draw  it  out  of  its  natural  current  is  to  lose  at 
once  all  its  power  Such  experiments  as  we  recall /^ 
are  those  in  which  some  sect  or  dogma  made  the  tie, 
and  that  was  an  artificial  element,  which  chilled  and 
checked  the  union.  But  is  it  quite  impossible  to 
believe  that  men  should  be  drawn  to  each  other  by 
the  simple  respect  which  each  man  feels  for  another 
in  whom  he  discovers  absolute  honesty  ;  the  respect 
he  feels  for  one  who  thinks  life  is  quite  too  coarse 
and  frivolous,  and  that  he  should  like  to  lift  it  a 
little,  should  like  to  be  the  friend  of  some  man's 
virtue  ?  for  another  who,  underneath  his  compliances 
with  artificial  society,  would  dearly  like  to  serve 
somebody,  —  to  test  his  own  reality  by  making  him- 
self useful  and  indispensable? 

Man  does  not  live  by  bread  alone,  but  by  faith, 
by  admiration,  by  sympathy.  'T  is  very  shallow  to 
say  that  cotton,  or  iron,  or  silver  and  gold  are  kings 
of  the  world  ;  there  are  rulers  that  will  at  any  mo- 
ment make  these  forgotten.  Fear  will.  Love  will. 
Character  will.  Men  live  by  their  credence.  Gov- 
ernments stand  by  it,  —  by  the  faith  that  the  people 
share,  —  whether  it  comes  from  the  religion  in 
which  they  were  bred,  or  from  an  original  conscience 
in  themselves,  which  the  popular  religion  echoes. 
If  government  could  only  stand  by  force,  if  the  in* 


THE  SOVEREIGNTY  OF  ETHICS.  203 

stinct  of  the  people  was  to  resist  the  government,  it 
is  plain  the  government  must  be  two  to  one  in  order 
to  be  secure,  and  then  it  would  not  be  safe  from  des- 
perate individuals.  But  no  ;  the  old  commandment, 
"  Thou  shalt  not  kill,"  holds  down  New  York,  and 
London,  and  Paris,  and  not  a  police  or  horse-guards. 

The  credence  of  men  it  is  that  moulds  them,  and 
creates  at  will  one  or  another  surface.  The  mind 
as  it  opens  transfers  very  fast  its  choice  from  the 
circumstance  to  the  cause ;  from  courtesy  to  love, 
from  inventions  to  science,  from  London  or  Wash- 
ington law,  or  public  opinion,  to  the  self-revealing 
idea  ;  from  all  that  talent  executes  to  the  sentiment 
that  fills  the  heart  and  dictates  the  future  of  nations. 
The  commanding  fact  which  I  never  do  not  see,  is 
the  sufficiency  of  the  moral  sentiment.  We  but- 
tress it  up,  in  shallow  hours  or  ages,  with  legends, 
traditions  and  forms,  each  good  for  the  one  moment 
in  which  it  was  a  happy  type  or  symbol  of  the  Power; 
but  the  Power  sends  in  the  next  moment  a  new  les- 
son, which  we  lose  while  our  eyes  are  reverted  and 
striving  to  perpetuate  the  old. 

America  shall  introduce  a  pure  religion.  Ethics 
are  thought  not  to  satisfy  affection.  But  all  the  re- 
ligion we  have  is  the  ethics  of  one  or  another  holy 
person ;  as  soon  as  character  appears,  be  sure  love 
will,  and  veneration,,  and  anecdotes  and  fables 
about  him,  and  delight  of  good  men  and  women  in 


204  THE  SOVEREIGNTY  OF  ETHICS. 

hhn.  And  what  deeps  of  grandeur  and  beauty  are 
known  to  us  in  ethical  truth,  what  divination  or  in- 
sight belongs  to  it !  For  innocence  is  a  wonderful 
electuary  for  purging  the  eyes  to  search  the  nature 
of  those  souls  that  pass  before  it.  What  armor  it 
is  to  protect  the  good  from  outward  or  inward  harm, 
and  with  what  power  it  converts  evil  accidents  into 
benefits ;  the  power  of  its  countenance ;  the  power 
of  its  presence !  To  it  alone  comes  true  friendship  ; 
to  it  come  grandeur  of  situation  and  poetic  percep- 
tion, enriching  all  it  deals  with. 

Once  men  thought  Spirit  divine,  and  Matter  dia- 
bolic ;  one  Ormuzd,  the  other  Ahriman.  Now  sci- 
ence and  philosophy  recognize  the  parallelism,  the 
approximation,  the  unity  of  the  two  :  how  each  re- 
flects the  other  as  face  answers  to  face  in  a  glass : 
nay,  how  the  laws  of  both  are  one,  or  how  one  is 
the  realization.     We  are  learning  not  to  fear  truth. 

The  man  of  this  age  must  be  matriculated  in  the 
university  of  sciences  and  tendencies  flowing  from 
all  past  periods.  He  must  not  be  one  who  can  be 
surprised  and  shipwrecked  by  every  bold  or  subtile 
word  which  malignant  and  acute  men  may  utter  in 
his  hearing,  but  should  be  taught  all  skepticisms  and 
unbeliefs,  and  made  the  destroyer  of  all  card-houses 
and  paper  walls,  and  the  sifter  of  all  opinions,  by 
being  put  face  to  face  from  his  infancy  with  Reality. 

A  man  who  has  accustomed  himself  to  look  at  all 


THE  SOVEREIGNTY  OF  ETHICS.  205 

his  circumstances  as  very  mutable,  to  carry  his  pos- 
sessions, his  relations  to  persons,  and  even  his  opin- 
ions, in  his  hand,  and  in  all  these  to  pierce  to  the 
principle  and  moral  law,  and  everywhere  to  find 
that,  —  has  put  himself  out  of  the  reach  of  all  skep- 
ticism ;  and  it  seems  as  if  whatever  is  most  affect- 
ing and  sublime  in  our  intercourse,  in  our  happiness, 
and  in  our  losses,  tended  steadily  to  uplift  us  to 
a  life  so  extraordinary,  and,  one  might  say,  super- 
human. 


THE   PREACHER. 


Ascending  thorough  just  degrees 
To  a  consummate  holiness, 
As  angel  blind  to  trespass  done, 
And  bleaching  all  souls  like  the  sun. 


THE  PREACHER.1 


In  the  history  of  opinion,  the  pinch  of  falsehood 
shows  itself  first,  not  in  argument  and  formal  pro- 
test, but  in  insincerity,  indifference  and  abandon- 
ment of  the  Church  or  the  scientific  or  political  or 
economic  institution  for  other  better  or  worse  forms. 

The  venerable  and  beautifid  traditions  in  which 
we  were  educated  are  losing  their  hold  on  human 
belief,  day  by  day ;  a  restlessness  and  dissatisfac- 
tion in  the  religious  world  marks  that  we  are  in  a 
moment  of  transition ;  as  when  the  Roman  Church 
broke  into  Protestant  and  Catholic,  or,  earlier, 
when  Paganism  broke  into  Christians  and  Pagans. 
The  old  forms  rattle,  and  the  new  delay  to  appear; 
material  and  industrial  activity  have  materialized 
the  age,  and  the  mind,  haughty  with  its  sciences, 
disdains  the  religious  forms  as  childish. 

1  Originally  written  as  a  parlor  lecture  to  some  Divinity 
students,  in  1867;  afterwards  enlarged  from  earlier  writings, 
and  read  in  its  present  form  at  the  Divinity  Chapel,  Cam- 
bridge, May  5th,  1879.  Reprinted  from  the  Unitarian  Review 
for  January,  1880. 

vol.  x.  14 


210  THE  PREACHER. 

In  consequence  of  this  revolution  in  opinion,  it 
appears,  for  the  time,  as  the  misfortune  of  this  pe- 
riod that  the  cultivated  mind  has  not  the  happiness 
and  dignity  of  the  religious  sentiment.  We  are 
born  too  late  for  the  old  and  too  early  for  the  new 
faith.  I  see  in  those  classes  and  those  persons  in 
whom  I  am  accustomed  to  look  for  tendency  and 
progress,  for  what  is  most  positive  and  most  rich 
in  human  nature,  and  who  contain  the  activity  of 
to-day  and  the  assurance  of  to-morrow,  —  I  see  in 
them  character,  but  skepticism  ;  a  clear  enough 
perception  of  the  inadequacy  of  the  popular  relig- 
ious statement  to  the  wants  of  their  heart  and  in- 
tellect, and  explicit  declarations  of  this  fact.  They 
have  insight  and  truthfulness  ;  they  will  not  mask 
their  convictions  ;  they  hate  cant ;  but  more  than 
this  I  do  not  readily  find.  The  gracious  motions 
of  the  soul,  —  piety,  adoration,  —  I  do  not  find. 
Scorn  of  hypocrisy,  pride  of  personal  character, 
elegance  of  taste  and  of  manners  and  pursuit,  a 
boundless  ambition  of  the  intellect,  willingness  to 
sacrifice  personal  interests  for  the  integrity  of  the 
character,  —  all  these  they  have  ;  but  that  religious 
submission  and  abandonment  which  give  man  a 
new  element  and  being,  and  make  him  sublime, 
—  it  is  not  in  churches,  it  is  not  in  houses.  I  see 
movement,  I  hear  aspirations,  but  I  see  not  how 
the  great  God  prepares  to  satisfy  the  heart  in  the 


THE  PREACHER.  211 

new  order  of  things.  No  Church,  no  State  emerges ; 
and  when  we  have  extricated  ourselves  from  all  the 
embarrassments  of  the  social  problem,  the  oracle 
does  not  yet  emit  any  light  on  the  mode  of  individ- 
ual life.  A  thousand  negatives  it  utters,  clear  and 
strong,  on  all  sides;  but  the  sacred  affirmative  it 
hides  in  the  deepest  abyss. 

We  do  not  see  that  heroic  resolutions  will  save 
men  from  those  tides  which  a  most  fatal  moon 
heaps  and  levels  in  the  moral,  emotive  and  intel- 
lectual nature.  It  is  certain  that  many  dark  hours, 
many  imbecilities,  periods  of  inactivity,  —  solstices 
when  we  make  no  progress,  but  stand  still,  —  will 
occur.  In  those  hours,  we  can  find  comfort  in  rev- 
erence of  the  highest  power,  and  only  in  that.  We 
never  do  quite  nothing,  or  never  need.  It  looks  as 
if  there  were  much  doubt,  much  waiting,  to  be  en- 
dured by  the  best.  Perhaps  there  must  be  austere 
elections  and  determinations  before  any  clear  vis- 
ion. 

No  age  and  no  person  is  destitute  of  the  senti- 
ment, but  in  actual  history  its  illustrious  exhibi- 
tions are  interrupted  and  periodical,  —  the  ages  of 
belief,  of  heroic  action,  of  intellectual  activity,  of 
men  cast  in  a  higher  mould. 

But  the  sentiment  that  pervades  a  nation,  the 
nation  must  react  upon.  It  is  resisted  and  cor- 
rupted by  that  obstinate  tendency  to  personify  and 


212  THE  PREACHER. 

bring  under  the  eyesight  what  should  be  the  con- 
templation of  Reason  alone.  The  Understanding 
will  write  out  the  vision  in  a  Confession  of  Faith. 
Art  will  embody  this  vanishing  Spirit  in  temples, 
pictures,  sculptures  and  hymns.  The  senses  in- 
stantly transfer  the  reverence  from  the  vanishing 
Spirit  to  this  steadfast  form.  Ignorance  and  pas- 
sion alloy  and  degrade.  In  proportion  to  a  man's 
want  of  goodness,  it  seems  to  him  another  and  not 
himself ;  that  is  to  say,  the  Deity  becomes  more  ob- 
jective, until  finally  flat  idolatry  prevails. 

Of  course  the  virtuous  sentiment  appears  ar- 
rayed against  the  nominal  religion,  and  the  true 
men  are  hunted  as  unbelievers,  and  burned.  Then 
the  good  sense  of  the  people  wakes  up  so  far  as  to 
take  tacit  part  with  them,  to  cast  off  reverence  for 
the  Church ;  and  there  follows  an  age  of  unbelief. 

This  analysis  was  inevitable  and  useful.  But 
the  sober  eye  finds  something  ghastly  in  this  em- 
piricism. At  first,  delighted  with  the  triumph  of 
the  intellect,  the  surprise  of  the  results  and  the 
sense  of  power,  we  are  like  hunters  on  the  scent 
and  soldiers  who  rush  to  battle:  but  when  the 
game  is  run  down,  when  the  enemy  lies  cold  in  his 
blood  at  our  feet,  we  are  alarmed  at  our  solitude  *, 
we  would  gladly  recall  the  life  that  so  offended  us ; 
the  face  seems  no  longer  that  of  an  enemy. 

I  say  the  effect  is  withering ;  for,  this  examina* 


TEE  PREACHER.  213 

fcion  resulting  in  the  constant  detection  of  errors, 
the  flattered  understanding  assumes  to  judge  all 
things,  and  to  anticipate  the  same  victories.  In 
the  activity  of  the  understanding,  the  sentiments 
sleep.  The  understanding  presumes  in  things 
above  its  sphere,  and,  because  it  has  exposed  errors 
in  a  church,  concludes  that  a  church  is  an  error ; 
because  it  has  found  absurdities  to  which  the  sen- 
timent of  veneration  is  attached,  sneers  at  venera- 
tion ;  so  that  analysis  has  run  to  seed  in  unbelief. 
There  is  no  faith  left.  We  laugh  and  hiss,  pleased 
with  our  power  in  making  heaven  and  earth  a 
howling  wilderness. 

Unlovely,  nay,  frightful,  is  the  solitude  of  the 
soul  which  is  without  God  in  the  world.  To  wan- 
der all  day  in  the  sunlight  among  the  tribes  of  ani- 
mals, unrelated  to  anything  better ;  to  behold  the 
horse,  cow  and  bird,  and  to  foresee  an  equal  and 
speedy  end  to  him  and  them  ;  —  no,  the  bird,  as  it 
hurried  by  with  its  bold  and  perfect  flight,  would 
disclaim  his  sympathy  and  declare  him  an  outcast. 
To  see  men  pursuing  in  faith  their  varied  action, 
warm-hearted,  providing  for  their  children,  loving 
their  friends,  performing  their  promises,  —  what 
are  they  to  this  chill,  houseless,  fatherless,  aimless 
Cain,  the  man  who  hears  only  the  sound  of  his  own 
footsteps  in  God's  resplendent  creation  ?  To  him, 
it  is  no  creation  ;  to  him,  these  fair  creatures  are 


214  THE  PREACHER. 

hapless  spectres :  he  knows  not  what  to  make  of  it. 
To  him,  heaven  and  earth  have  lost  their  beauty. 
How  gloomy  is  the  day,  and  upon  yonder  shining 
pond  what  melancholy  light !  I  cannot  keep  the 
sun  in  heaven,  if  you  take  away  the  purpose  that 
animates  him.  The  ball,  indeed,  is  there,  but  his 
power  to  cheer,  to  illuminate  the  heart  as  well  as 
the  atmosphere,  is  gone  forever.  It  is  a  lamp-wick 
for  meanest  uses.  The  words,  great,  venerable, 
have  lost  their  meaning;  every  thought  loses  all 
its  depth  and  has  become  mere  surface. 

But  religion  has  an  object.  It  does  not  grow  thin 
or  robust  with  the  health  of  the  votary.  The  object 
of  adoration  remains  forever  unhurt  and  identical. 
We  are  in  transition,  from  the  worship  of  the  fa- 
thers which  enshrined  the  law  in  a  private  and  per- 
sonal history,  to  a  worship  which  recognizes  the 
true  eternity  of  the  law,  its  presence  to  you  and 
me,  its  equal  energy  in  what  is  called  brute  nature 
as  in  what  is  called  sacred.  The  next  age  will 
behold  God  in  the  ethical  laws  —  as  mankind  be- 
gins to  see  them  in  this  age,  self-equal,  self-execu- 
ting, instantaneous  and  self-affirmed;  needing  no 
voucher,  no  prophet  and  no  miracle  besides  their 
own  irresistibility,  —  and  will  regard  natural  his- 
tory, private  fortunes  and  politics,  not  for  them- 
selves, as  we  have  done,  but  as  illustrations  of  those 
laws,  of  that  beatitude  and  love.     Nature  is  too 


THE  PREACHER.  215 

thin  a  screen  ;  the  glory  of  the  One  breaks  in 
everywhere. 

Every  movement  of  religious  opinion  is  of  pro- 
found importance  to  politics  and  social  life  ;  and 
this  of  to-day  has  the  best  omens  as  being  of  the 
most  expansive  humanity,  since  it  seeks  to  find  in 
every  nation  and  creed  the  imperishable  doctrines. 
I  find  myself  always  struck  and  stimulated  by  a 
good  anecdote,  any  trait  of  heroism,  of  faithful 
service.  I  do  not  find  that  the  age  or  country 
makes  the  least  difference  ;  no,  nor  the  language  the 
actors  spoke,  nor  the  religion  which  they  professed, 
whether  Arab  in  the  desert,  or  Frenchman  in  the 
Academy.  I  see  that  sensible  men  and  consci- 
entious men  all  over  the  world  were  of  one  relig- 
ion, —  the  religion  of  well-doing  and  daring,  men 
of  sturdy  truth,  men  of  integrity  and  feeling  for 
others.  My  inference  is  that  there  is  a  statement 
of  religion  possible  which  makes  all  skepticism  ab- 
surd. 

The  health  and  welfare  of  man  consist  in  ascent 
from  surfaces  to  solids  ;  from  occupation  with  de- 
tails to  knowledge  of  the  design  ;  from  self-activity 
of  talents,  which  lose  their  way  by  the  lust  of  dis- 
play, to  the  controlling  and  reinforcing  of  talents 
by  the  emanation  of  character.  All  that  we  call 
religion,  all  that  saints  and  churches  and  Bibles 
from  the  beginning  of  the  world  have  aimed  at,  is 


216  THE  PREACHER. 

to  suppress  this  impertinent  surface-action,  and  an* 
imate  man  to  central  and  entire  action.  The  human 
race  are  afflicted  with  a  St.  Vitus'  dance  ;  their  fin- 
gers and  toes,  their  members,  their  senses,  their  tal- 
ents, are  superfluously  active,  while  the  torpid  heart 
gives  no  oracle.  When  that  wakes,  it  will  revolu- 
tionize the  world.  Let  that  speak,  and  all  these 
rebels  will  fly  to  their  loyalty.  Now  every  man  de- 
feats his  own  action,  —  professes  this  but  practises 
the  reverse;  with  one  hand  rows,  and  with  the 
other  backs  water.  A  man  acts  not  from  one  mo- 
tive, but  from  many  shifting  fears  and  short  mo- 
tives ;  it  is  as  if  he  were  ten  or  twenty  less  men 
than  himself,  acting  at  discord  with  one  another, 
so  that  the  result  of  most  lives  is  zero.  But  when 
he  shall  act  from  one  motive,  and  all  his  faculties 
play  true,  it  is  clear  mathematically,  is  it  not,  that 
this  will  tell  in  the  result  as  if  twenty  men  had  co- 
operated, —  will  give  new  senses,  new  wisdom  of  its 
own  kind ;  that  is,  not  more  facts,  nor  new  combi- 
nations, but  divination,  or  direct  intuition  of  the 
state  of  men  and  things  ? 

The  lessons  of  the  moral  sentiment  arc,  once  for 
all,  an  emancipation  from  that  anxiety  which  takes 
the  joy  out  of  all  life.  It  teaches  a  great  peace.  It 
comes  itself  from  the  highest  place.  It  is  that, 
"which  being  in  all  sound  natures,  and  strongest  in 
the  best  and  most  gifted  men,  we  know  to  be  im- 


THE  PREACHER.  217 

planted  by  the  Creator  of  Men.  It  is  a  command- 
ment at  every  moment  and  in  every  condition  of  life 
to  do  the  duty  of  that  moment  and  to  abstain  from 
doing  the  wrong.  And  it  is  so  near  and  inward  and 
constitutional  to  each,  that  no  commandment  can 
compare  with  it  in  authority.  All  wise  men  regard 
it  as  the  voice  of  the  Creator  himself. 

I  know  there  are  those  to  whom  the  question  of 
what  shall  be  believed  is  the  more  interesting  be- 
cause they  are  to  proclaim  and  teach  what  they 
believe. 

All  positive  rules,  ceremonial,  ecclesiastical,  dis- 
tinctions of  race  or  of  person,  are  perishable ;  only 
those  distinctions  hold  which  are  in  the  nature  of 
things,  not  matters  of  positive  ordinance.  As  the 
earth  we  stand  upon  is  not  imperishable,  but  is 
chemically  resolvable  into  gases  and  nebulae,  so  is 
the  universe  an  infinite  series  of  planes,  each  of 
which  is  a  false  bottom ;  and,  when  we  think  our 
feet  are  planted  now  at  last  on  adamant,  the  slide 
is  drawn  out  from  under  us. 

We  must  reconcile  ourselves  to  the  new  order  of 
things.  But  is  it  a  calamity  ?  The  poet  Words- 
worth greeted  even  the  steam-engine  and  railroads  ; 
and  when  they  came  into  his  poetic  Westmoreland, 
bisecting  every  delightful  valley,  deforming  every 
consecrated  grove,  yet  manned  himself  to  say  :  — 


218  THE  PREACHER. 

"  In  spite  of  all  that  Beauty  may  disown 
In  your  harsh  features,  Nature  doth  embrace 
Her  lawful  offspring  in  man's  art,  and  Time, 
Pleased  with  your  triumphs  o'er  his  brother  Space, 
Accepts  from  your  bold  hands  the  proffered  crown 
Of  hope,  and  smiles  on  you  with  cheer  sublime." 

And  we  can  keep  our  religion,  despite  of  the  vio- 
lent railroads  of  generalization,  whether  French  or 
German,  that  block  and  intersect  our  old  parish 
highways. 

In  matters  of  religion,  men  eagerly  fasten  their 
eyes  on  the  differences  between  their  creed  and 
yours,  whilst  the  charm  of  the  study  is  in  finding 
the  agreements  and  identities  in  all  the  religions 
of  men.  What  is  essential  to  the  theologian  is, 
that  whilst  he  is  select  in  his  opinions,  severe  in  his 
search  for  truth,  he  shall  be  broad  in  his  sympa- 
thies, —  not  to  allow  himself  to  be  excluded  from 
any  church.  He  is  to  claim  for  his  own  whatever 
eloquence  of  St.  Chrysostom  or  St.  Jerome  or  St. 
Bernard  he  has  felt.  So  not  less  of  Bishop  Taylor 
or  George  Herbert  or  Henry  Scougal.  He  sees 
that  what  is  most  effective  in  the  writer  is  what  is 
dear  to  his,  the  reader's,  mind. 

Be  not  betrayed  into  undervaluing  the  churches 
which  annoy  you  by  their  bigoted  claims.  They 
too  were  real  churches.  They  answered  to  their 
times  the  same  need  as  your  rejection  of  them  does 


THE  PREACHER.  219 

to  ours.  The  Catholic  Church  has  been  immensely 
rich  in  men  and  influences.  Augustine,  a  Kempis, 
Fenelon,  breathe  the  very  spirit  which  now  fires 
you.  So  with  Cuclworth,  More,  Bunyan.  I  agree 
with  them  more  than  I  disagree.  I  agree  with 
their  heart  and  motive  ;  my  discontent  is  with  their 
limitations  and  surface  and  language.  Their  state- 
ment is  grown  as  fabulous  as  Dante's  Inferno. 
Their  purpose  is  as  real  as  Dante's  sentiment  and 
hatred  of  vice.  Always  put  the  best  interpretation 
on  a  tenet.  Why  not  on  Christianity,  wholesome, 
sweet  and  poetic  ?  It  is  the  record  of  a  pure  and 
holy  soul,  humble,  absolutely  disinterested,  a  truth- 
speaker  and  bent  on  serving,  teaching  and  uplift- 
ing men.  Christianity  taught  the  capacity,  the 
element,  to  love  the  All-perfect  without  a  stingy 
bargain  for  personal  happiness.  It  taught  that  to 
love  him  was  happiness,  —  to  love  him  in  other's 
virtues. 

An  era  in  human  history  is  the  life  of  Jesus  ;  and 
the  immense  influence  for  good  leaves  all  the  per- 
version and  superstition  almost  harmless.  Man- 
kind have  been  subdued  to  the  acceptance  of  his 
doctrine,  and  cannot  spare  the  benefit  of  so  pure  a 
servant  of  truth  and  love. 

Of  course  a  hero  so  attractive  to  the  hearts  of 
millions  drew  the  hypocrite  and  the  ambitious  into 
his  train,  and  they  used  his  name  to  falsifv  his  his- 


220  THE  PREACHER. 

tory  and  undo  his  work.  I  fear  that  what  is  called 
religion,  but  is  perhaps  pew-holding,  not  obeys  but 
conceals  the  moral  sentiment.  I  put  it  to  this  sim= 
pie  test:  Is  a  rich  rogue  made  to  feel  his  roguery 
among  divines  or  literary  men  ?  No  ?  Then  't  is 
rogue  again  under  the  cassock.  What  sort  of  re- 
spect can  these  preachers  or  newspapers  inspire  by 
their  weekly  praises  of  texts  and  saints,  when  we 
know  that  they  would  say  just  the  same  things  if 
Beelzebub  had  written  the  chapter,  provided  it 
stood  where  it  does  in  the  public  opinion  ? 

Anything  but  unbelief,  anything  but  losing  hold 
of  the  moral  intuitions,  as  betrayed  in  the  clinging 
to  a  form  of  devotion  or  a  theological  dogma ;  as  if 
it  was  the  liturgy,  or  the  chapel,  that  was  sacred, 
and  not  justice  and  humility  and  the  loving  heart 
and  serving  hand. 

But  besides  the  passion  and  interest  which  per- 
vert, is  the  shallowness  which  impoverishes.  The 
opinions  of  men  lose  all  worth  to  him  who  perceives 
that  they  are  accurately  predictable  from  the 
ground  of  their  sect.  Nothing  is  more  rare,  in  any 
man,  than  an  act  of  his  own.  The  clergy  are  as 
like  as  peas.  I  cannot  tell  them  apart.  It  was 
said  :  They  have  bronchitis  because  they  read  from 
their  papers  sermons  with  a  near  voice,  and  then, 
looking  at  the  congregation,  they  try  to  speak  with 
their  far  voice,  and  the  shock  is  noxious.     I  think 


THE  PREACHER.  221 

they  do  this,  or  the  converse  of  this,  with  their 
thought.  They  look  into  Plato,  or  into  the  mind, 
and  then  try  to  make  parish  mince-meat  of  the 
amplitudes  and  eternities,  and  the  shock  is  noxious. 
It  is  the  old  story  again  :  once  we  had  wooden  chal- 
ices and  golden  priests,  now  we  have  golden  chal- 
ices and  wooden  priests. 

The  clergy  are  always  in  danger  of  becoming 
wards  and  pensioners  of  the  so-called  producing 
classes.  Their  first  duty  is  self-possession  founded 
on  knowledge.  The  man  of  practice  or  worldly 
force  requires  of  the  preacher  a  talent,  a  force,  like 
his  own ;  the  same  as  his  own,  but  wholly  applied  to 
the  priest's  things.  He  does  not  forgive  an  applica- 
tion in  the  preacher  to  the  merchant's  things.  He 
wishes  him  to  be  such  a  one  as  he  himself  should 
have  been,  had  he  been  priest.  He  is  sincere  and 
ardent  in  his  vocation,  and  plunged  in  it.  Let 
priest  or  poet  be  as  good  in  theirs. 

The  simple  fact  that  the  pulpit  exists,  that  all 
over  this  country  the  people  are  waiting  to  hear  a 
sermon  on  Sunday,  assures  that  opportunity  which 
is  inestimable  to  young  men,  students  of  theology, 
for  those  large  liberties.  The  existence  of  the  Sun- 
day, and  the  pulpit  waiting  for  a  weekly  sermon, 
give  him  the  very  conditions,  the  ttov  a™  he  wants. 
That  must  be  filled,  and  he  is  armed  to  fill  it.  Let 
him  value  his  talent  as  a  door  into  Nature.    Let  him 


222  THE  PREACHER. 

see  his  performances  only  as  limitations.  Then, 
over  all,  let  him  value  the  sensibility  that  receives, 
that  loves,  that  dares,  that  affirms. 

There  are  always  plenty  of  young,  ignorant  peo- 
ple, —  though  some  of  them  are  seven,  and  some  of 
them  seventy  years  old,  —  wanting  peremptorily 
instruction  ;  but,  in  the  usual  averages  of  parishes, 
only  one  person  that  is  qualified  to  give  it.  It  is 
only  that  person  who  concerns  me,  —  him  only  that 
I  see.  The  others  are  very  amiable  and  promising, 
but  they  are  only  neuters  in  the  hive,  —  every  one 
a  possible  royal  bee,  but  not  now  significant.  It 
does  not  signify  what  they  say  or  think  to-day ;  't  is 
the  cry  and  the  babble  of  the  nursery,  and  their 
only  virtue,  docility.  Buckminster,  Charming,  Dr. 
Lowell,  Edward  Taylor,  Parker,  Bushnell,  Chapin, 
—  it  is  they  who  have  been  necessary,  and  the 
opinions  of  the  floating  crowd  of  no  importance 
whatever. 

I  do  not  love  sensation  preaching,  —  the  person* 
alities  for  spite,  the  hurrah  for  our  side,  the  re- 
view of  our  appearances  and  what  others  say  of  us ! 
That  you  may  read  in  the  gazette.  We  come  to 
church  properly  for  self-examination,  for  approach 
to  principles  to  see  how  it  stands  with  us,  with  the 
deep  and  dear  facts  of  right  and  love.  At  the 
same  time  it  is  impossible  to  pay  no  regard  to  the 
day's  events,  to  the  public  opinion  of  the  times,  to 


THE  PREACHER.  223 

the  stirring  shouts  of  parties,  to  the  calamities  and 
prosperities  of  our  town  and  country ;  to  war  and 
peace,  new  events,  great  personages,  to  good  har- 
vests, new  resources,  to  bankruptcies,  famines  and 
desolations.  We  are  not  stocks  or  stones,  we  are 
not  thinking  machines,  but  allied  to  men  around 
us,  as  really  though  not  quite  so  visibly  as  the  Si- 
amese brothers.  And  it  were  inhuman  to  affect 
ignorance  or  indifference  on  Sundays  to  what  makes 
our  blood  beat  and  our  countenance  dejected  Sat- 
urday or  Monday.  No,  these  are  fair  tests  to  try 
our  doctrines  by,  and  see  if  they  are  worth  any- 
thing in  life.  The  value  of  a  principle  is  the  num- 
ber of  things  it  will  explain  ;  and  there  is  no  good 
theory  of  disease  which  does  not  at  once  suggest  a 
cure. 

Man  proposes,  but  God  disposes.  We  shall  not 
very  long  have  any  part  or  lot  in  this  earth,  in 
whose  affairs  we  so  hotly  mix,  and  where  we  feel 
and  speak  so  energetically  of  our  country  and  our 
cause.  It  is  a  comfort  to  reflect  that  the  gigantic 
evils  which  seem  to  us  so  mischievous  and  so  in- 
curable will  at  last  end  themselves  and  rid  the 
world  of  their  presence,  as  all  crime  sooner  or  later 
must.  But  be  that  event  for  us  soon  or  late,  we 
are  not  excused  from  playing  our  short  part  in  the 
best  manner  we  can,  no  matter  how  insignificant 
our  aid  may  be.     Our  children  will  be  here,  if  we 


224  THE  PREACHER. 

are  not ;  and  their  children's  history  will  be  colored 
by  our  action.  But  if  we  have  no  children,  or  if 
the  events  in  which  we  have  taken  our  part  shall 
not  see  their  solution  until  a  distant  future,  there 
is  yet  a  deeper  fact ;  that  as  much  justice  as  we 
can  see  and  practise  is  useful  to  men,  and  impera- 
tive, whether  we  can  see  it  to  be  useful  or  not. 

The  essential  ground  of  a  new  book  or  a  new 
sermon  is  a  new  spirit.  The  author  has  a  new 
thought,  sees  the  sweep  of  a  more  comprehensive 
tendency  than  others  are  aware  of ;  falters  never, 
but  takes  the  victorious  tone.  For  power  is  not  so 
much  shown  in  talent  as  in  tone.  And  if  I  had 
to  counsel  a  young  preacher,  I  should  say :  When 
there  is  any  difference  felt  between  the  foot-board 
of  the  pulpit  and  the  floor  of  the  parlor,  you  have 
not  yet  said  that  which  you  should  say. 

Inspiration  will  have  advance,  affirmation,  the 
forward  foot,  the  ascending  state  ;  it  will  be  an 
opener  of  doors ;  it  will  invent  its  own  methods : 
the  new  wine  will  make  the  bottles  new.  Spirit  is 
motive  and  ascending.  Only  let  there  be  a  deep 
observer,  and  he  will  make  light  of  new  shop  and 
new  circumstance  that  afflict  you;  new  shop,  or 
old  cathedral,  it  is  all  one  to  him.  He  will  find  the 
circumstance  not  altered,  as  deep  a  cloud  of  mys- 
tery on  the  cause,  as  dazzling  a  glory  on  the  invin- 
cible law.     Given  the  insight,  and  he  will  find  as 


THE  PREACHER.  225 

many  beauties  and  heroes  and  strokes  of  genius 
close  by  him  as  Dante  or  Shakspeare  beheld.  A 
vivid  thought  brings  the  power  to  paint  it ;  and  in 
proportion  to  the  depth  of  its  source  is  the  force  of 
its  projection.  We  are  happy  and  enriched ;  we  go 
away  invigorated,  assisted  each  in  our  own  work, 
however  different,  and  shall  not  forget  to  come 
again  for  new  impulses. 

The  supposed  embarrassments  to  young  clergy- 
men exist  only  to  feeble  wills.  They  need  not 
consider  them.  The  differences  of  opinion,  the 
strength  of  old  sects  or  timorous  literalists,  since  it 
is  not  armed  with  prisons  or  fagots  as  in  ruder 
times  or  countries,  is  not  worth  considering  except 
as  furnishing  a  needed  stimulus.  That  gray  dea- 
con or  respectable  matron  with  Calvinistic  anteced- 
ents, you  can  readily  see,  could  not  have  presented 
any  obstacle  to  the  march  of  St.  Bernard  or  of 
George  Fox,  of  Luther  or  of  Theodore  Parker. 
And  though  I  observe  the  deafness  to  counsel 
among  men,  yet  the  power  of  sympathy  is  always 
great;  and  affirmative  discourse,  presuming  assent, 
will  often  obtain  it  when  argument  would  fail. 
Such,  too,  is  the  active  power  of  good  temperament. 
Great  sweetness  of  temper  neutralizes  such  vast 
amounts  of  acid!  As  for  position,  the  position  is 
always  the  same,  —  insulting  the  timid,  and  not 
taken  by  storm,  but  flanked,  I  may  say,  by  the  reso- 

VOL.  x.  15 


226  THE  PREACHER. 

lute,  simply  by  minding  their  own  affair.  Speak 
the  affirmative  ;  emphasize  your  choice  by  utter  ig- 
noring of  all  that  you  reject ;  seeing  that  opinions 
are  temporary,  but  convictions  uniform  and  eter- 
nal,—  seeing  that  a  sentiment  never  loses  its  pathos 
or  its  persuasion,  but  is  youthful  after  a  thousand 
years. 

The  inevitable  course  of  remark  for  us,  when  we 
meet  each  other  for  meditation  on  life  and  duty,  is 
not  so  much  the  enjoining  of  this  or  that  cure  or 
burning  out  of  our  errors  of  practice,  as  simply  the 
celebration  of  the  power  and  beneficence  amid  which 
and  by  which  we  live,  not  critical,  but  affirmative. 

All  civil  mankind  have  agreed  in  leaving  one  day 
for  contemplation  against  six  for  practice.  I  hope 
that  day  will  keep  its  honor  and  its  use.  A  wise 
man  advises  that  we  should  see  to  it  that  we  read 
and  speak  two  or  three  reasonable  words,  every  day, 
amid  the  crowd  of  affairs  and  the  noise  of  trifles. 
I  should  say  boldly  that  we  should  astonish  every 
day  by  a  beam  out  of  eternity  ;  retire  a  moment  to 
the  grand  secret  we  carry  in  our  bosom,  of  inspira- 
tion from  heaven.  But  certainly  on  this  seventh 
let  us  be  the  children  of  liberty,  of  reason,  of  hope ; 
refresh  the  sentiment  ;  think  as  spirits  think,  who 
belong  to  the  universe,  whilst  our  feet  walk  in  the 
streets  of  a  little  town  and  our  hands  work  in  a 
small  knot  of  affairs.     We  shall  find  one  result,  1 


THE  PREACHER.  227 

am  sure,  —  a  certain  originality  and  a  certain 
haughty  liberty  proceeding  out  of  our  retirement 
and  self-communion,  which  streets  can  never  give, 
infinitely  removed  from  all  vaporing  and  bravado, 
and  which  yet  is  more  than  a  match  for  any  physi- 
cal resistance.  It  is  true  that  which  they  say  of 
our  New  England  oestrum,  which  will  never  let  us 
stand  or  sit,  but  drives  us  like  mad  through  the 
world.  The  calmest  and  most  protected  life  can- 
not save  us.  We  want  some  intercalated  days,  to 
bethink  us  and  to  derive  order  to  our  life  from  the 
heart.  That  should  be  the  use  of  the  Sabbath,  — 
to  check  this  headlong  racing  and  put  us  in  posses- 
sion of  ourselves  once  more,  for  love  or  for  shame. 

The  Sabbath  changes  its  forms  from  age  to  age, 
but  the  substantial  benefit  endures.  We  no  longer 
recite  the  old  creeds  of  Athanasius  or  Arius,  of 
Calvin  or  Hopkins.  The  forms  are  flexible,  but 
the  uses  not  less  real.  The  old  heart  remains  as 
ever  with  its  old  human  duties.  The  old  intellect 
still  lives,  to  pierce  the  shows  to  the  core.  Truth 
is  simple,  and  will  not  be  antique ;  is  ever  present, 
and  insists  on  being  of  this  age  and  of  this  moment. 
Here  is  thought  and  love  and  truth  and  duty,  new 
as  on  the  first  day  of  Adam  and  of  angels. 

"  There  are  two  pairs  of  eyes  in  man ;  and  it  is 
requisite  that  the  pair  which  are  beneath  should  be 
closed  when  the  pair  that  are  above  them  perceive ; 


228  THE  PREACHER. 

and  that  when  the  pair  above  are  closed,  those  which 
are  beneath  are  opened."  The  lower  eyes  see  only- 
surfaces  and  effects,  the  upper  eyes  behold  causes 
and  the  connection  of  things.  And  when  we  go 
alone,  or  come  into  the  house  of  thought  and  wor- 
ship, we  come  with  purpose  to  be  disabused  of  ap- 
pearances, to  see  realities,  the  great  lines  of  our 
destiny,  to  see  that  life  has  no  caprice  or  fortune, 
is  no  hopping  squib,  but  a  growth  after  immutable 
laws  under  beneficent  influences  the  most  immense. 
The  Church  is  open  to  great  and  small  in  all  na- 
tions ;  and  how  rare  and  lofty,  how  unattainable, 
are  the  aims  it  labors  to  set  before  men !  We  come 
to  educate,  come  to  isolate,  to  be  abstractionists;  in 
fine,  to  open  the  upper  eyes  to  the  deep  mystery  of 
cause  and  effect,  to  know  that  though  ministers  of 
justice  and  power  fail,  Justice  and  Power  fail  never. 
The  open  secret  of  the  world  is  the  art  of  subliming 
a  private  soul  with  inspirations  from  the  great  and 
public  and  divine  Soul  from  which  we  live. 


THE   MAN   OF    LETTERS. 


Oisr  bravely  through  the  sunshine  and  the  showers? 
Time  hath  his  work  to  do,  and  we  have  ours* 


So  nigh  is  grandeur  to  our  dust, 

So  near  is  God  to  man  ; 
When  Duty  whispers  low  4  Thou  must/* 

The  youth  replies,  '  I  can.' 


THE  MAN  OF  LETTERS. 

AN   ADDRESS  DELIVERED    BEFORE    THE   LITERARY  SOCIETIES 
OF    WATERVILLE   COLLEGE,  1863. 


Gentlemen  of  the  Literary  Societies  :  — 

Some  of  you  are  to-day  saying  your  farewells  to 
each  other,  and  to-morrow  will  receive  the  parting 
honors  of  the  College.  You  go  to  be  teachers,  to 
become  physicians,  lawyers,  divines  ;  in  due  course, 
statesmen,  naturalists,  philanthropists ;  I  hope,  some 
of  you,  to  be  the  men  of  letters,  critics,  philoso- 
phers ;  perhaps  the  rare  gift  of  poetry  already  spar- 
kles, and  may  yet  burn.  At  all  events,  before  the 
shadows  of  these  times  darken  over  your  youthful 
sensibility  and  candor,  let  me  use  the  occasion  which 
your  kind  request  gives  me,  to  offer  you  some  coun- 
sels which  an  old  scholar  may  without  pretension 
bring  to  youth,  in  regard  to  the  career  of  letters,  — 
the  power  and  joy  that  belong  to  it,  and  its  high 
office  in  evil  times.  I  offer  perpetual  congratulation 
to  the  scholar  ;  he  has  drawn  the  white  lot  in  life. 
The  very  disadvantages  of  his  condition  point  at 
superiorities.     He  is  too  good  for  the  world ;  he  is 


232  THE  MAN  OF  LETTERS. 

in  advance  of  his  race ;  his  function  is  prophetic. 
He  belongs  to  a  superior  societ}^  and  is  born  one 
or  two  centuries  too  early  for  the  rough  and  sensual 
population  into  which  he  is  thrown.  But  the 
Heaven  which  sent  him  hither  knew  that  well 
enough,  and  sent  him  as  a  leader  to  lead.  Are  men 
perplexed  with  evil  times  ?  The  inviolate  soul  is 
in  perpetual  telegraphic  communication  with  the 
source  of  events.  He  has  earlier  information,  a 
private  despatch  which  relieves  him  of  the  terror 
which  presses  on  the  rest  of  the  community.  He  is 
a  learner  of  the  laws  of  nature  and  the  experiences 
of  history ;  a  prophet  surrendered  with  self-aban- 
doning sincerity  to  the  Heaven  which  pours  through 
him  its  will  to  mankind.  This  is  the  theory,  but 
you  know  how  far  this  is  from  the  fact,  that  nothing 
has  been  able  to  resist  the  tide  with  which  the  mate- 
rial prosperity  of  America  in  years  past  has  beat 
down  the  hope  of  youth,  the  piety  of  learning.  The 
country  was  full  of  activity,  with  its  wheat,  coal, 
iron,  cotton  ;  the  wealth  of  the  globe  was  here,  too 
much  work  and  not  men  enough  to  do  it.  Britain, 
France,  Germany,  Scandinavia  sent  millions  of  la- 
borers ;  still  the  need  was  more.  Every  kind  of 
skill  was  in  demand,  and  the  bribe  came  to  men  of 
intellectual  culture,  —  Come,  drudge  in  our  mill. 
America  at  large  exhibited  such  a  confusion  as  Cah 
ifornia  showed  in  1849,  when  the  cry  of   gold  was 


THE  MAN  OF  LETTERS.  233 

first  raised.  All  the  distinctions  of  profession  and 
habit  ended  at  the  mines.  All  the  world  took  off 
their  coats  and  worked  in  shirt-sleeves.  Lawyers 
went  and  came  with  pick  and  wheelbarrow ;  doctors 
of  medicine  turned  teamsters  ;  stray  clergymen  kept 
the  bar  in  saloons ;  professors  of  colleges  sold  cigars, 
mince-pies,  matches,  and  so  on.  It  is  the  perpetual 
tendency  of  wealth  to  draw  on  the  spiritual  class, 
not  in  this  coarse  way,  but  in  plausible  and  covert 
ways.  It  is  charged  that  all  vigorous  nations,  ex- 
cept our  own,  have  balanced  their  labor  by  mental 
activity,  and  especially  by  the  imagination,  —  the 
cardinal  human  power,  the  angel  of  earnest  and  be- 
lieving ages.  The  subtle  Hindoo,  who  carried  re- 
ligion to  ecstasy  and  philosophy  to  idealism,  pro- 
duced the  wonderful  epics  of  which,  in  the  present 
century,  the  translations  have  added  new  regions  to 
thought.  The  Egyptian  built  Thebes  and  Karnak 
on  a  scale  which  dwarfs  our  art,  and  by  the  paint- 
ings on  their  interior  walls  invited  us  into  the  secret 
of  the  religious  belief  whence  he  drew  such  power. 
The  Greek  was  so  perfect  in  action  and  in  imagi- 
nation, his  poems,  from  Homer  to  Euripides,  so 
charming  in  form  and  so  true  to  the  human  mind, 
that  we  cannot  forget  or  outgrow  their  mythology. 
The  Hebrew  nation  compensated  for  the  insignifi- 
cance of  its  members  and  territory  by  its  religious 
genius,  its  tenacious  belief ;  its  poems  and  histories 


234  THE  MAN  OF  LETTERS. 

cling  to  the  soil  of  this  globe  like  the  primitive 
rocks.  On  the  south  and  east  shores  of  the  Medi- 
terranean Mahomet  impressed  his  fierce  genius  how 
deeply  into  the  manners,  language  and  poetry  of 
Arabia  and  Persia  !  See  the  activity  of  the  imagi- 
nation in  the  Crusades  :  the  front  of  morn  was  full 
of  fiery  shapes  ;  the  chasm  was  bridged  over  ;  heaven 
walked  on  earth,  and  Earth  could  see  with  eyes  the 
Paradise  and  the  Inferno.  Dramatic  "  mysteries  " 
were  the  entertainment  of  the  people.  Parliaments 
of  Love  and  Poesy  served  them,  instead  of  the 
House  of  Commons,  Congress  and  the  newspapers. 
In  Puritanism,  how  the  whole  Jewish  history  be- 
came flesh  and  blood  in  those  men,  let  Bunyan  show. 
Now  it  is  agreed  that  we  are  utilitarian ;  that  we 
are  skeptical,  frivolous;  that  with  universal  cheap 
education  we  have  stringent  theology,  but  religion 
is  low.  There  is  much  criticism,  not  on  deep 
grounds,  but  an  affirmative  philosophy  is  wanting. 
Our  profoundest  philosophy  (if  it  were  not  contra- 
diction in  terms)  is  skepticism.  The  great  poem  of 
the  age  is  the  disagreeable  poem  of  "Faust,"  — of 
which  the  "  Festus  "  of  Bailey  and  the  "  Paracel- 
sus "  of  Browning  are  English  variations.  We 
have  superficial  sciences,  restless,  gossiping,  aimless 
activity.  We  run  to  Paris,  to  London,  to  Rome,  to 
Mesmerism,  Spiritualism,  to  Pusey,  to  the  Catholic 
Church,  as  if  for  the  want  of  thought,  and  those 


THE  MAN  OF  LETTERS.  235 

who  would  check  and  guide  have  a  dreary  feeling 
that  in  the  change  and  decay  of  the  old  creeds  and 
motives  there  was  no  offset  to  supply  their  place. 
Our  industrial  skill,  arts  ministering  to  convenience 
and  luxury,  have  made  life  expensive,  and  there- 
fore greedy,  careful,  anxious ;  have  turned  the  eyes 
downward  to  the  earth,  not  upward  to  thought. 

Ernest  Renan  finds  that  Europe  has  thrice  as- 
sembled for  exhibitions  of  industry,  and  not  a  poem 
graced  the  occasion  ;  and  nobody  remarked  the  de- 
fect. A  French  prophet  of  our  age,  Fourier,  pre- 
dicted that  one  day,  instead  of  by  battles  and 
CEcumenical  Councils,  the  rival  portions  of  human- 
ity would  dispute  each  other's  excellence  in  the 
manufacture  of  little  cakes. 

"In  my  youth,"  said  a  Scotch  mountaineer,  "a 
Highland  gentleman  measured  his  importance  by 
the  number  of  men  his  domain  could  support. 
After  some  time  the  question  was,  to  know  how 
many  great  cattle  it  would  feed.  To-day  we  are 
come  to  count  the  number  of  sheep.  I  suppose 
posterity  will  ask  how  many  rats  and  mice  it  will 
feed."   * 

Dickens  complained  that  in  America,  as  soon  as 
he  arrived  in  any  of  the  Western  towns,  a  committee 
waited  on  him  and  invited  him  to  deliver  a  temper- 
ance lecture.  Bowditch  translated  Laplace,  and 
when  he  removed  to  Boston,  the  Hospital  Life  As- 


236  THE  MAN  OF  LETTERS. 

surance  Company  insisted  that  he  should  make 
their  tables  of  annuities.  Napoleon  knows  the  art 
of  war,  but  should  not  be  put  on  picket  duty. 
Linnaeus  or  Robert  Brown  must  not  be  set  to  raise 
gooseberries  and  cucumbers,  though  they  be  excel- 
lent botanists,  A  shrewd  broker  out  of  State 
Street  visited  a  quiet  countryman  possessed  of  all 
the  virtues,  and  in  his  glib  talk  said,  "  With  your 
character  now  I  could  raise  all  this  money  at  once, 
and  make  an  excellent  thing  of  it." 

There  is  an  oracle  current  in  the  world,  that  na- 
tions die  by  suicide.  The  sign  of  it  is  the  decay 
of  thought.  Niebuhr  has  given  striking  examples 
of  that  fatal  portent ;  as  in  the  loss  of  power  of 
thought  that  followed  the  disasters  of  the  Athe- 
nians in  Sicily. 

I  cannot  forgive  a  scholar  his  homeless  despond- 
ency. He  represents  intellectual  or  spiritual  force. 
I  wish  him  to  rely  on  the  spiritual  arm ;  to  live  by 
his  strength,  not  by  his  weakness.  A  scholar  de- 
fending the  cause  of  slavery,  of  arbitrary  govern- 
ment, of  monopoly,  of  the  oppressor,  is  a  traitor  to 
his  profession.  He  has  ceased  to  be  a  scholar.  He 
is  not  company  for  clean  people.  The  worst  times 
only  show  him  how  independent  he  is  of  times ; 
only  relieve  and  bring  out  the  splendor  of  his  priv- 
ilege. Disease  alarms  the  family,  but  the  physi- 
cian sees  in  it  a  temporary  mischief,  which  he  can 


THE  MAN  OF  LETTERS.  237 

check  and  expel.  The  fears  and  agitations  of  men 
who  watch  the  markets,  the  crops,  the  plenty  or 
scarcity  of  money,  or  other  superficial  events,  are 
not  for  him.  He  knows  that  the  world  is  always 
equal  to  itself ;  that  the  forces  which  uphold  and 
pervade  it  are  eternal.  Air,  water,  fire,  iron,  gold, 
wheat,  electricity,  animal  fibre,  have  not  lost  a  par- 
ticle of  power,  and  no  decay  has  crept  over  the  spir- 
itual force  which  gives  bias  and  period  to  bound- 
less nature.  Bad  times,  —  what  are  bad  times  ? 
Nature  is  rich,  exuberant,  and  mocks  at  the  puny 
forces  of  destruction.  Man  makes  no  more  im- 
pression on  her  wealth  than  the  caterpillar  or  the 
cankerworm  whose  petty  ravage,  though  noticed  in 
an  orchard  or  a  village,  is  insignificant  in  the  vast 
exuberance  of  the  summer.  There  is  no  unem- 
ployed force  in  Nature.  All  decomposition  is  re- 
composition.  War  disorganizes,  but  it  is  to  reorgan- 
ize. Weeks,  months  pass  —  a  new  harvest ;  trade 
springs  up,  and  there  stand  new  cities,  new  homes, 
all  rebuilt  and  sleepy  with  permanence.  Italy, 
France  —  a  hundred  times  those  countries  have 
been  trampled  with  armies  and  burned  over :  a  few 
summers,  and  they  smile  with  plenty  and  yield  new 
men  and  new  revenues. 

If  churches  are  effete,  it  is  because  the  new 
Heaven  forms.  You  are  here  as  the  carriers  of  the 
power  of  Nature,  —  as  Roger  Bacon,  with  his  secret 


238  THE  MAN  OF  LETTERS. 

of  gunpowder,  with  his  secret  of  the  balloon  and  of 
steam ;  as  Copernicus,  with  his  secret  of  the  true 
astronomy ;  as  Columbus,  with  America  in  his  log- 
book ;  as  Newton,  with  his  gravity ;  Harvey,  with 
his  circulation ;  Smith,  with  his  law  of  trade ;  Frank- 
lin, with  lightning;  Adams,  with  Independence; 
Kant,  with  pure  reason  ;  Swedenborg,  with  his  spir- 
itual world.  You  are  the  carriers  of  ideas  which 
are  to  fashion  the  mind  and  so  the  history  of  this 
breathing  world,  so  as  they  snail  be,  and  not  other- 
wise. 

Every  man  is  a  scholar  potentially,  and  does  not 
need  any  one  good  so  much  as  this  of  right  thought. 

"  Calm  pleasures  here  abide,  majestic  pains." 

Coleridge  traces  "three  silent  revolutions,"  of 
which  the  first  was  "when  the  clergy  fell  from  the 
Church."  A  scholar  was  once  a  priest.  But  the 
Church  clung  to  ritual,  and  the  scholar  clung  to 
joy,  low  as  well  as  high,  and  thus  the  separation 
was  a  mutual  fault.  But  I  think  it  is  a  schism 
which  must  be  healed.  The  true  scholar  is  the 
Church.  Only  the  duties  of  Intellect  must  be 
owned.  Down  with  these  dapper  trimmers  and 
sycophants  !  let  us  have  masculine  and  divine  men, 
formidable  lawgivers,  Pythagoras,  Plato,  Aristotle, 
who  warp  the  churches  of  the  world  from  their  tra- 
ditions, and  penetrate  them  through  and  through 


THE  MAN  OF  LETTERS.  239 

with  original  perception.  The  intellectual  man 
lives  in  perpetual  victory.  As  certainly  as  water 
falls  in  rain  on  the  tops  of  mountains  and  runs 
down  into  valleys,  plains  and  pits,  so  does  thought 
fall  first  on  the  best  minds,  and  run  down,  from 
class  to  class,  until  it  reaches  the  masses,  and  works 
revolutions. 

Nature  says  to  the  American  :  "  I  understand 
mensuration  and  numbers  ;  I  compute  the  ellipse 
of  the  moon,  the  ebb  and  flow  of  waters,  the  curve 
and  the  errors  of  planets,  the  balance  of  attrac- 
tion and  recoil.  I  have  measured  out  to  you  by 
weight  and  tally  the  powers  you  need.  I  give  you 
the  land  and  sea,  the  forest  and  the  mine,  the  ele- 
mental forces,  nervous  energy.  When  I  add  diffi- 
culty, I  add  brain.  See  to  it  that  you  hold  and  ad- 
minister the  continent  for  mankind.  One  thing 
you  have  rightly  done.  You  have  offered  a  patch 
of  land  in  the  wilderness  to  every  son  of  Adam  who 
will  till  it.  Other  things  you  have  begun  to  do,  — 
to  strike  off  the  chains  which  snuffling  hypocrites 
had  bound  on  the  weaker  race.  You  are  to  im- 
peril your  lives  and  fortunes  for  a  principle.  The 
ambassador  is  held  to  maintain  the  dignity  of  the 
Republic  which  he  represents.  But  what  does  the 
scholar  represent  ?  The  organ  of  ideas,  the  subtle 
force  which  creates  Nature  and  men  and  states ; 
—  consoler,  upholder,  imparting  pulses  of  light  and 


240  TEE  MAN  OF  LETTERS. 

shocks  of  electricity,  guidance  and  courage.  So  let 
his  habits  be  formed,  and  all  his  economies  heroic ; 
no  spoiled  child,  no  drone,  no  epicure,  but  a  stoic, 
formidable,  athletic,  knowing  how  to  be  poor,  lov- 
ing labor,  and  not  flogging  his  youthful  wit  with 
tobacco  and  wine  ;  treasuring  his  youth.  I  wish  the 
youth  to  be  an  armed  and  complete  man ;  no  help- 
less angel  to  be  slapped  in  the  face,  but  a  man 
dipped  in  the  Styx  of  human  experience,  and  made 
invulnerable  so,  —  self -helping.  A  redeeming  trait 
of  the  Sophists  of  Athens,  Hippias  and  Gorgias,  is 
that  they  made  their  own  clothes  and  shoes.  Learn 
to  harness  a  horse,  to  row  a  boat,  to  camp  down  in 
the  woods,  to  cook  your  supper.  I  chanced  lately 
to  be  at  West  Point,  and,  after  attending  the  exam- 
ination in  scientific  classes,  I  went  into  the  barracks. 
The  chamber  was  in  perfect  order ;  the  mattress  on 
the  iron  camp-bed  rolled  up,  as  if  ready  for  removal. 
I  asked  the  first  Cadet,  "  Who  makes  your  bed  ?  " 
"I  do."  "Who  fetches  your  water?"  "I  do." 
"Who  blacks  your  shoes?"  "I  do."  It  was  so 
in  every  room.  These  are  first  steps  to  power. 
Learn  of  Samuel  Johnson  or  David  Hume,  that  it 
is  a  primary  duty  of  the  man  of  letters  to  secure  his 
independence. 

Stand  by  your  order.  'Tis  some  thirty  years 
since  the  days  of  the  Reform  Bill  in  England,  when 
on  the  walls  in  London  you  read  everywhere  plac- 


THE  MAN  OF  LETTERS.  241 

ards,  "  Down  with  the  Lords."  At  that  time,  Earl 
Grey,  who  was  leader  of  Reform,  was  asked,  in  Par- 
liament, his  policy  on  the  measures  of  the  Radicals. 
He  replied,  "  I  shall  stand  by  my  order."  Where 
there  is  no  vision,  the  people  perish.  The  fault  lies 
with  the  educated  class,  the  men  of  study  and 
thought.  There  is  a  very  low  feeling  of  duty  :  the 
merchant  is  true  to  the  merchant,  the  noble  in  Eng- 
land and  Europe  stands  by  his  order,  the  politician 
believes  in  his  arts  and  combinations;  but  the 
scholar  does  not  stand  by  his  order,  but  defers  to 
the  men  of  this  world. 

Gentlemen,  I  am  here  to  commend  to  you  your 
art  and  profession  as  thinkers.  It  is  real.  It  is  the 
secret  of  power.  It  is  the  art  of  command.  All  su- 
periority is  this,  or  related  to  this.  "  All  that  the 
world  admires  comes  from  within."  Thought  makes 
us  men  ;  ranks  us  ;  distributes  society  ;  distributes 
the  work  of  the  world  ;  is  the  prolific  source  of  all 
arts,  of  all  wealth,  of  all  delight,  of  all  grandeur. 
Men  are  as  they  believe.  Men  are  as  they  think, 
and  the  man  who  knows  any  truth  not  yet  discerned 
by  other  men,  is  master  of  all  other  men  so  far  as 
that  truth  and  its  wide  relations  are  concerned. 

Intellect  measures  itself  by  its  counteraction  to 
any  accumulation  of  material  force.  There  is  no 
mass  which  it  cannot  surmount  and  dispose  o£ 
The  exertions  of  this  force  are  the  eminent  experi- 

VOL.  X.  16 


242  THE  MAN  OF  LETTERS. 

ences,  —  out  of  a  long  life  all  that  is  worth  remem« 
bering.  These  are  the  moments  that  balance  years. 
Does  any  one  doubt  between  the  strength  of  a 
thought  and  that  of  an  institution  ?  Does  any  one 
doubt  that  a  good  general  is  better  than  a  park  of 
artillery  ?  See  a  political  revolution  dogging  a 
book.  See  armies,  institutions,  literatures,  appear- 
ing in  the  train  of  some  wild  Arabian's  dream. 

There  is  a  proverb  that  Napoleon,  when  the  Mam- 
eluke cavalry  approached  the  French  lines,  ordered 
the  grenadiers  to  the  front,  and  the  asses  and  the 
savans  to  fall  into  the  hollow  square.  It  made  a 
good  story,  and  circulated  in  that  day.  But  how 
stands  it  now  ?  The  military  expedition  was  a  fail- 
ure. Bonaparte  himself  deserted,  and  the  army  got 
home  as  it  could,  all  fruitless ;  not  a  trace  of  it  re- 
mains. All  that  is  left  of  it  is  the  researches  of 
those  savans  on  the  antiquities  of  Egypt,  including 
the  great  work  of  Denon,  which  led  the  way  to  all 
the  subsequent  studies  of  the  English  and  German 
scholars  on  that  foundation.  Pytheas  of  -ZEgina 
was  victor  in  the  Pancratium  of  the  boys,  at  the 
Isthmian  games.  He  came  to  the  poet  Pindar  and 
wished  him  to  write  an  ode  in  his  praise,  and  in- 
quired what  was  the  price  of  a  poem.  Pindar  re- 
plied that  he  should  give  him  one  talent,  about  a 
thousand  dollars  of  our  money.  "  A  talent !  "  cried 
Pytheas  ;  "  why,  for  so  much  money  I  can  erect  a 


THE  MAN  OF  LETTERS.  243 

statue  of  bronze  in  the  temple."  "  Very  likeljo" 
On  second  thoughts,  he  returned  and  paid  for  the 
poem.  And  now  not  only  all  the  statues  of  bronze 
in  the  temples  of  iEgina  are  destroyed,  but  the 
temples  themselves,  and  the  very  walls  of  the  city 
are  utterly  gone,  whilst  the  ode  of  Pindar,  in  praise 
of  Pytheas,  remains  entire. 

The  treachery  of  scholars  !  They  are  idealists, 
and  should  stand  for  freedom,  justice,  and  public 
good.  The  scholar  is  bound  to  stand  for  all  the 
virtues  and  all  the  liberties,  —  liberty  of  trade,  lib- 
erty of  the  press,  liberty  of  religion,  —  and  he 
should  open  all  the  prizes  of  success  and  all  the 
roads  of  Nature  to  free  competition. 

The  country  complains  loudly  of  the  inefficiency 
of  the  army.  It  was  badly  led.  But,  before  this, 
it  was  not  the  army  alone,  it  was  the  population  that 
was  badly  led.  The  clerisy,  the  spiritual  guides, 
the  scholars,  the  seers  have  been  false  to  their 
trust. 

Kely  on  yourself.  There  is  respect  due  to  your 
teachers,  but  every  age  is  new,  and  has  problems 
to  solve,  insoluble  by  the  last  age.  Men  over  forty 
are  no  judges  of  a  book  written  in  a  new  spirit. 
Neither  your  teachers,  nor  the  universal  teachers, 
the  laws,  the  customs  or  dogmas  of  nations,  neither 
saint  nor  sage,  can  compare  with  that  counsel  which 
is  open  to  you.     No,  it  is  not  nations,  no,  nor  even 


244  THE  MAN  OF  LETTERS. 

masters,  not  at  last  a  few  individuals  or  any  heroes, 
but  himself  only,  the  large  equality  to  truth  of  a 
single  mind,  —  as  if,  in  the  narrow  walls  of  a  human 
heart,  the  wide  realm  of  truth,  the  world  of  morals, 
the  tribunal  by  which  the  universe  is  judged,  found 
room  to  exist. 

Our  people  have  this  levity  and  complaisance,  — 
they  fear  to  offend,  do  not  wish  to  be  misunderstood ; 
do  not  wish,  of  all  things,  to  be  in  the  minority. 
God  and  Nature  are  altogether  sincere,  and  Art 
should  be  as  sincere.  It  is  not  enough  that  the  work 
should  show  a  skilful  hand,  ingenious  contrivance 
and  admirable  polish  and  finish ;  it  should  have  a 
commanding  motive  in  the  time  and  condition  in 
which  it  was  made.  We  should  see  in  it  the  great 
belief  of  the  artist,  which  caused  him  to  make  it  so 
as  he  did,  and  not  otherwise  ;  nothing  frivolous, 
nothing  that  he  might  do  or  not  do,  as  he  chose,  but 
somewhat  that  must  be  done  then  and  there  by 
him ;  he  could  not  take  his  neck  out  of  that  yoke, 
and  save  his  soul.  And  this  design  must  shine 
through  the  whole  performance.  Sincerity  is,  in 
dangerous  times,  discovered  to  be  an  immeasurable 
advantage.  I  distrust  all  the  legends  of  great  ac- 
complishments or  performance  of  unprincipled  men. 
Yery  little  reliance  must  be  put  on  the  common  sto- 
ries that  circulate  of  this  great  senator's  or  that 
great  barrister's  learning,  their  Greek,  their  varied 
literature.     That  ice  won't  bear.     Reading !  —  do 


THE  MAN  OF  LETTERS.  245 

you  mean  that  this  senator  or  this  lawyer,  who  stood 
by  and  allowed  the  passage  of  infamous  laws,  was  a 
reader  of  Greek  books  ?  That  is  not  the  question ; 
but  to  what  purpose  did  they  read  ?  I  allow  them 
the  merit  of  that  reading  which  appears  in  their 
opinions,  tastes,  beliefs,  and  practice.  They  read 
that  they  might  know,  did  they  not  ?  Well,  these 
men  did  not  know.  They  blundered;  they  were 
utterly  ignorant  of  that  which  every  boy  or  girl  of 
fifteen  knows  perfectly,  —  the  rights  of  men  and 
women.  And  this  big-mouthed  talker,  among  his 
dictionaries  and  Leipzic  editions  of  Lysias,  had  lost 
his  knowledge.  But  the  President  of  the  Bank 
nods  to  the  President  of  the  Insurance  Office,  and 
relates  that  at  Virginia  Springs  this  idol  of  the 
forum  exhausted  a  trunkful  of  classic  authors. 
There  is  always  the  previous  question,  How  came 
you  on  that  side  ?  You  are  a  very  elegant  writer, 
but  you  can't  write  up  what  gravitates  down. 

It  is  impossible  to  extricate  oneself  from  the 
questions  in  which  our  age  is  involved.  All  of  us 
have  shared  the  new  enthusiasm  of  country  and  of 
liberty  which  swept  like  a  whirlwind  through  all 
souls  at  the  outbreak  of  war,  and  brought,  by  enno- 
bling us,  an  offset  for  its  calamity. 

War,  seeking  for  the  roots  of  strength,  comes  upon 
the  moral  aspects  at  once.  In  quiet  times,  custom  sti- 
fles this  discussion  as  sentimental,  and  brings  in  the 
brazen  devil,  as  by  immemorial  right.     The  war  up- 


246  THE  MAN  OF  LETTERS. 

lifted  us  into  generous  sentiments.  War  ennobles 
the  age.  We  do  not  often  have  a  moment  of  gran- 
deur in  these  hurried,  slipshod  lives,  but  the  be- 
havior of  the  young  men  has  taught  us  much.  We 
will  not  again  disparage  America,  now  that  we  have 
seen  what  men  it  will  bear.  Battle,  with  the  sword, 
has  cut  many  a  Gordian  knot  in  twain  which  all 
the  wit  of  East  and  West,  of  Northern  and  Border 
statesmen  could  not  untie. 

I  learn  with  joy  and  with  deep  respect  that  this 
college  has  sent  its  full  quota  to  the  field.  I  learn 
with  grief,  but  with  honoring  pain,  that  you  have 
had  your  sufferers  in  the  battle,  and  that  the  noble 
youth  have  returned  wounded  and  maimed.  The 
times  are  dark,  but  heroic.  The  times  develop  the 
strength  they  need.  Boys  are  heroes.  Women 
have  shown  a  tender  patriotism  and  inexhaustible 
charity.  And  on  each  new  threat  of  faction,  the 
ballot  of  the  people  has  been  unexpectedly  right. 
But  the  issues  already  appearing  overpay  the  cost. 
Slavery  is  broken,  and,  if  we  use  our  advantage,  ir- 
retrievably. For  such  a  gain,  to  end  once  for  all 
that  pest  of  all  our  free  institutions,  one  generation 
might  well  be  sacrificed  ;  perhaps  it  will ;  that  this 
continent  be  purged  and  a  new  era  of  equal  rights 
dawn  on  the  universe.  Who  would  not,  if  it  could 
be  made  certain  that  the  new  morning  of  universal 
liberty  should  rise  on  our  race  by  the  perishing  of 
one  generation,  —  who  would  not  consent  to  die? 


THE  SCHOLAR. 


For  thought,  and  not  praise, 

Thought  is  the  wages 
For  which  I  sell  days, 

Will  gladly  sell  ages 

And  willing  grow  old, 

Deaf  and  dumb,  blind  and  cold, 
Melting  matter  into  dreams, 
Panoramas  which  I  saw, 
And  whatever  glows  or  seems 

Into  substance,  into  Law. 


The  sun  and  moon  shall  fall  amain 
Like  sowers'  seeds  into  his  brain, 
There  quickened  to  be  born  again0 


THE  SCHOLAE. 


AN  ORATION  DELIVERED  BEFORE  THE  WASHINGTON  AND 
JEFFERSON  SOCIETIES  AT  THE  UNIVERSITY  OF  VIRGINIA, 
28TH  JUNE,   1876. 

Gentlemen  : 

The  Athenians  took  an  oath,  on  a  certain  crisis 
in  their  affairs,  to  esteem  wheat,  the  vine  and  the 
olive  the  bounds  of  Attica.  The  territory  of  schol- 
ars is  yet  larger.  A  stranger  but  yesterday  to  every 
person  present,  I  find  myself  already  at  home,  for 
the  society  of  lettered  men  is  a  university  which 
does  not  bound  itself  with  the  walls  of  one  cloister 
or  college,  but  gathers-in  the  distant  and  solitary 
student  into  its  strictest  amity.  Literary  men  gladly 
acknowledge  these  ties  which  find  for  the  homeless 
and  the  stranger  a  welcome  where  least  looked  for. 
But  in  proportion  as  we  are  conversant  with  the  laws 
of  life,  we  have  seen  the  like.  We  are  used  to  these 
surprises.  This  is  but  one  operation  of  a  more  gen- 
eral law.  As  in  coming  among  strange  faces  we 
find  that  the  love  of  letters  makes  us  friends,  so  in 
strange  thoughts,  in  the  worldly  habits  which  harden 
us,  we  find  with  some  surprise  that  learning  and 


250  THE  SCHOLAR. 

truth  and  beauty  have  not  let  us  go ;  that  the  spir- 
itual nature  is  too  strong  for  us ;  that  those  excellent 
influences  which  men  in  all  ages  have  called  the 
Muse,  or  by  some  kindred  name,  come  in  to  keep 
us  warm  and  true ;  that  the  face  of  Nature  remains 
irresistibly  alluring.  We  have  strayed  from  the 
territorial  monuments  of  Attica,  but  here  still  are 
wheat  and  olives  and  the  vine. 

I  do  not  now  refer  to  that  intellectual  conscience 
which  forms  itself  in  tender  natures,  and  gives  us 
many  twinges  for  our  sloth  and  unfaithfulness :  — 
the  influence  I  speak  of  is  of  a  higher  strain.  Stung 
by  this  intellectual  conscience,  we  go  to  measure  our 
tasks  as  scholars,  and  screw  ourselves  up  to  energy 
and  fidelity,  and  our  sadness  is  suddenly  overshone 
by  a  sympathy  of  blessing.  Beauty,  the  inspirer, 
the  cheerful  festal  principle,  the  leader  of  gods  and 
men,  which  draws  by  being  beautiful,  and  not  by 
considerations  of  advantage,  comes  in  and  puts  a 
new  face  on  the  world.  I  think  the  peculiar  office 
of  scholars  in  a  careful  and  gloomy  generation  is  to 
be  (as  the  poets  were  called  in  the  Middle  Ages) 
Professors  of  the  Joyous  Science,  detectors  and  de- 
lineators of  occult  symmetries  and  unpublished 
beauties ;  heralds  of  civility,  nobility,  learning  and 
wisdom  ;  affirmers  of  the  one  law,  yet  as  those  who 
should  affirm  it  in  music  and  dancing ;  expressors 
themselves  of  that  firm  and  cheerful  temper,  infi- 


TILE  SCHOLAR.  251 

nitely  removed  from  sadness,  which  reigns  through 
the  kingdoms  of  chemistry,  vegetation,  and  animal 
life.  Every  natural  power  exhilarates  ;  a  true  tal- 
ent delights  the  possessor  first.  A  celebrated  mu- 
sician was  wont  to  say,  that  men  knew  not  how 
much  more  he  delighted  himself  with  his  playing 
than  he  did  others ;  for  if  they  knew,  his  hearers 
would  rather  demand  of  him  than  give  him  a  re- 
ward. The  scholar  is  here  to  fill  others  with  love 
and  courage  by  confirming  their  trust  in  the  love 
and  wisdom  which  are  at  the  heart  of  all  things  ; 
to  affirm  noble  sentiments  ;  to  hear  them  wherever 
spoken,  out  of  the  deeps  of  ages,  out  of  the  obscur- 
ities of  barbarous  life,  and  to  republish  them :  —  to 
untune  nobody,  but  to  draw  all  men  after  the  truth, 
and  to  keep  men  spiritual  and  sweet. 

Language  can  hardly  exaggerate  the  beatitude 
of  the  intellect  flowing  into  the  faculties.  This  is 
the  power  that  makes  the  world  incarnated  in  man, 
and  laying  again  the  beams  of  heaven  and  earth, 
setting  the  north  and  the  south,  and  the  stars  in 
their  places.  Intellect  is  the  science  of  metes  and 
bounds  ;  yet  it  sees  no  bound  to  the  eternal  proceed- 
ing of  law  forth  into  nature.  All  the  sciences  are 
only  new  applications,  each  translatable  into  the 
other,  of  the  one  law  which  his  mind  is. 

This,  gentlemen,  is  the  topic  on  which  I  shall 
speak,  —  the  natural  and  permanent  function  of 


252  THE  SCHOLAR. 

the  Scholar,  as  lie  is  no  permissive  or  accidental 
appearance,  bnt  an  organic  agent  in  nature.  He 
is  here  to  be  the  beholder  of  the  real ;  self-centred 
amidst  the  superficial ;  here  to  revere  the  dominion 
of  a  serene  necessity  and  be  its  pupil  and  apprentice 
by  tracing  everything  home  to  a  cause ;  here  to  be 
sobered,  not  by  the  cares  of  life,  as  men  say,  no, 
but  by  the  depth  of  his  draughts  of  the  cup  of  im- 
mortality. 

One  is  tempted  to  affirm  the  office  and  attributes 
of  the  scholar  a  little  the  more  eagerly,  because  of  a 
frequent  perversity  of  the  class  itself.  Men  are 
ashamed  of  their  intellect.  The  men  committed  by 
profession  as  well  as  by  bias  to  study,  the  clergy- 
man, the  chemist,  the  astronomer,  the  metaphysician, 
the  poet,  talk  hard  and  worldly,  and  share  the  in- 
fatuation of  cities.  The  poet  and  the  citizen  per- 
fectly agree  in  conversation  on  the  wise  life.  The 
poet  counsels  his  own  son  as  if  he  were  a  merchant. 
The  poet  with  poets  betrays  no  amiable  weakness. 
They  all  chime  in,  and  are  as  inexorable  as  bankers 
on  the  subject  of  real  life.  They  have  no  toleration 
for  literature;  art  is  only  a  fine  word  for  appear- 
ance in  default  of  matter.  And  they  sit  white  over 
their  stoves,  and  talk  themselves  hoarse  over  the 
mischief  of  books  and  the  effeminacy  of  book-mak- 
ers. But  at  a  single  strain  of  a  bugle  out  of  a  grove, 
or  at  the  dashing  among  the  stones  of  a  brook  from 


THE  SCHOLAR.  253 

the  hills ;  at  the  sound  of  some  subtle  word  that 
falls  from  the  lips  of  an  imaginative  person,  or  even 
at  the  reading  in  solitude  of  some  moving  image  of 
a  wise  poet,  this  grave  conclusion  is  blown  out  of 
memory;  the  sun  shines,  and  the  worlds  roll  to 
music,  and  the  poet  replaces  all  this  cowardly  Self- 
denial  and  God-denial  of  the  literary  class  with  the 
conviction  that  to  one  poetic  success  the  world  will 
surrender  on  its  knees.  Instantly  he  casts  in  his 
lot  with  the  pearl-diver  and  the  diamond-merchant. 
Like  them  he  will  joyfully  lose  days  and  months, 
and  estates  and  credit,  in  the  profound  hope  that 
one  restoring,  all-rewarding,  immense  success  will 
arrive  at  last,  which  will  give  him  at  one  bound  a 
universal  dominion.  And  rightly  ;  for  if  his  wild 
prayers  are  granted,  if  he  is  to  succeed,  his  achieve- 
ment is  the  piercing  of  the  brass  heavens  of  use  and 
limitation,  and  letting  in  a  beam  of  the  pure  eter- 
nity which  burns  up  this  limbo  of  shadows  and  chi- 
meras in  which  we  dwell.  Yes,  Nature  is  too  strong 
for  us ;  she  will  not  be  denied ;  she  has  balsams  for 
our  hurts,  and  hellebores  for  'our  insanities.  She 
does  not  bandy  words  with  us,  but  comes  in  with  a 
new  ravishing  experience  and  makes  the  old  time 
ridiculous.  Every  poet  knows  the  unspeakable 
hope,  and  represents  its  audacity. 

I  am  not  disposed  to  magnify  temporary  differ- 
ences, but  for  the  moment  it  appears  as  if  in  for- 


254  THE  SCHOLAR. 

mer  times  learning  and  intellectual  accomplish- 
ments had  secured  to  the  possessor  greater  rank 
and  authority.  If  this  were  only  the  reaction  from 
excessive  expectations  from  literature,  now  disap- 
pointed, it  were  a  just  censure.  It  was  super- 
stitious to  exact  too  much  from  philosophers  and 
the  literary  class.  The  Sophists,  the  Alexandrian 
grammarians,  the  wits  of  Queen  Anne's,  the  phi- 
losophers and  diffusion  -  societies  have  not  much 
helped  us.  Granted,  freely  granted.  Men  run 
out  of  one  superstition  into  an  opposite  superstition, 
and  practical  people  in  America  give  themselves 
wonderful  airs.  The  cant  of  the  time  inquires 
superciliously  after  the  new  ideas;  it  believes  that 
ideas  do  not  lead  to  the  owning  of  stocks ;  they 
are  perplexing  and  effeminating. 

Young  men,  I  warn  you  against  the  clamors  of 
these  self -praising  frivolous  activities,  —  against 
these  busy-bodies  ;  against  irrational  labor ;  against 
chattering,  meddlesome,  rich  and  official  people.  If 
their  doing  came  to  any  good  end  !  Action  is  le- 
gitimate and  good ;  forever  be  it  honored !  right, 
original,  private,  necessary  action,  proceeding  new 
from  the  heart  of  man,  and  going  forth  to  benefi- 
cent and  as  yet  incalculable  ends.  Yes ;  but  not  a 
petty  fingering  and  running,  a  senseless  repeating 
of  yesterday's  fingering  and  running  ;  an  accept- 
ance of  the  method  and  frauds  of  other  men :  an 


THE  SCHOLAR.  '    255 

overdoing  and  busy-ness  which  pretends  to  the  hon- 
ors of  action,  but  resembles  the  twitches  of  St.  Vitus. 
The  action  of  these  men  I  cannot  respect,  for  they 
do  not  respect  it  themselves.  They  were  better 
and  more  respectable  abed  and  asleep.  All  the 
best  of  this  class,  all  who  have  any  insight  or  gen- 
erosity of  spirit  are  frequently  disgusted,  and  fain 
to  put  it  behind  them. 

Gentlemen,  I  do  not  wish  to  check  your  impulses 
to  action :  I  would  not  hinder  you  of  one  swing  of 
your  arm.  I  do  not  wish  to  see  you  effeminate 
gownsmen,  taking  hold  of  the  world  with  the  tips 
of  your  fingers,  or  that  life  should  be  to  you  as  it 
is  to  many,  optical,  not  practical.  Far  otherwise  : 
I  rather  wish  you  to  experiment  boldly  and  give 
play  to  your  energies,  but  not,  if  I  could  prevail 
with  you,  in  conventional  ways.  I  should  wish 
your  energy  to  run  in  works  and  emergencies  grow- 
ing out  of  your  personal  character.  Nature  will 
fast  enough  instruct  you  in  the  occasion  and  the 
need,  and  will  bring  to  each  of  you  the  crowded 
hour,  the  great  opportunity.  Love,  Eectitude,  ev- 
erlasting Fame,  will  come  to  each  of  you  in  loneli- 
est places  with  their  grand  alternatives,  and  Honor 
watches  to  see  whether  you  dare  seize  the  palms. 

I  have  no  quarrel  with  action,  only  I  prefer  no 
action  to  misaction,  and  I  reject  the  abusive  appli- 
cation of  the  term  practical  to  those  lower  activi- 


256    -  THE  SCHOLAR, 

ties.  Let  us  hear  no  more  of  the  practical  men,  or 
I  will  tell  you  something  of  them,  —  this,  namely, 
that  the  scholar  finds  in  them  unlooked-for  accept- 
ance of  his  most  paradoxical  experience.  There  is 
confession  in  their  eyes,  and  if  they  parade  their 
business  and  public  importance,  it  is  by  way  of 
apology  and  palliation  for  not  being  the  students 
and  obeyers  of  those  diviner  laws.  Talk  frankly 
with  them  and  you  learn  that  you  have  little  to  tell 
them ;  that  the  Spirit  of  the  Age  has  been  before 
you  with  influences  impossible  to.  parry  or  resist. 
The  dry-goods  men,  and  the  brokers,  the  lawyers 
and  the  manufacturers  are  idealists,  and  only  differ 
from  the  philosopher  in  the  intensity  of  the  charge. 
We  are  all  contemporaries  and  bones  of  one  body. 
The  shallow  clamor  against  theoretic  men  comes 
from  the  weak.  Able  men  may  sometimes  affect 
a  contempt  for  thought,  which  no  able  man  ever 
feels.  For  what  alone  in  the  history  of  this  world 
interests  all  men  in  proportion  as  they  are  men  ? 
What  but  truth,  and  perpetual  advance  in  knowl- 
edge of  it,  and  brave  obedience  to  it  in  right  ac- 
tion ?  Every  man  or  woman  who  can  voluntarily 
or  involuntarily  give  them  any  insight  or  sugges- 
tion on  these  secrets  they  will  hearken  after.  The 
poet  writes  his  verse  on  a  scrap  of  paper,  and  in- 
stantly  the  desire  and  love  of  all  mankind  take 
charge  of  it,  as  if  it  were  Holy  Writ.     What  need 


THE  SCHOLAR.  257 

has  he  to  cross  the  sill  of  his  door  ?  Why  need  he 
meddle  with  politics  ?  His  idlest  thought,  his  yes- 
ternight's dream  is  told  already  in  the  Senate. 
What  the  Genius  whispered  him  at  night  he  re- 
ported to  the  young  men  at  dawn.  He  rides  in 
them,  he  traverses  sea  and  land.  The  engineer  in 
the  locomotive  is  waiting  for  him ;  the  steamboat 
is  hissing  at  the  wharf,  and  the  wheels  whirling  to 
go.  'Tis  wonderful,  'tis  almost  scandalous,  this 
extraordinary  favoritism  shown  to  poets.  I  do  not 
mean  to  excuse  it.  I  admit  the  enormous  partial- 
ity. It  only  shows  that  such  is  the  gulf  between 
our  perception  and  our  painting,  the  eye  is  so  wise, 
and  the  hand  so  clumsy,  that  all  the  human  race 
have  agreed  to  value  a  man  according  to  his  power 
of  expression.  For  him  arms,  art,  politics,  trade 
waited  like  menials,  until  the  lord  of  the  manor 
should  arrive.  Even  the  demonstrations  of  nature 
for  millenniums  seem  not  to  have  attained  their 
end,  until  this  interpreter  arrives.  "  I,"  said  the 
great-hearted  Kepler,  "  may  well  wait  a  hundred 
years  for  a  reader,  since  God  Almighty  has  waited 
six  thousand  years  for  an  observer  like  myself." 

Genius  is  a  poor  man  and  has  no  house,  but  see, 
this  proud  landlord  who  has  built  the  palace  and 
furnished  it  so  delicately,  opens  it  to  him  and  be- 
seeches him  to  make  it  honorable  by  entering  there 
and  eating*  bread.    Where  is  the  palace  in  England 

VOL.  x.  17 


258  THE  SCHOLAR. 

whose  tenants  are  not  too  nappy  if  it  can  make  a 
home  for  Pope  or  Addison  or  Swift  or  Burke  or 
Canning  or  Tennyson  ?  Or  if  wealth  has  humors 
and  wishes  to  shake  off  the  yoke  and  assert  itself,  — ■ 
oh,  by  all  means  let  it  try !  Will  it  build  its  fences 
very  high,  and  make  its  Almacks  too  narrow  for  a 
wise  man  to  enter?  Will  it  be  independent?  I 
incline  to  concede  the  isolation  which  it  asks,  that  it 
may  learn  that  it  is  not  independent  but  parasitical. 

There  could  always  be  traced,  in  the  most  bar- 
barous tribes,  and  also  in  the  most  character-de- 
stroying civilization,  some  vestiges  of  a  faith  in  gen- 
ius, as  in  the  exemption  of  a  priesthood  or  bards 
or  artists  from  taxes  and  tolls  levied  on  other  men ; 
or  in  civic  distinction ;  or  in  enthusiastic  homage ; 
or  in  hospitalities ;  as  if  men  would  signify  their 
sense  that  genius  and  virtue  should  not  pay  money 
for  house  and  land  and  bread,  because  they  have 
a  royal  right  in  these  and  in  all  things,  —  a  first 
mortgage  that  takes  effect  before  the  right  of  the 
present  proprietor.  For  they  are  the  First  Good, 
of  which  Plato  affirms  that  "  all  things  are  for  its 
sake,  and  it  is  the  cause  of  everything  beautiful." 

This  reverence  is  the  re-establishment  of  natural 
order;  for  as  the  solidest  rocks  are  made  up  of  in- 
visible gases,  as  the  world  is  made  of  thickened  light 
and  arrested  electricity,  so  men  know  that  ideas  are 
the  parents  of  men  and  things ;  there  was  never  any- 


THE  SCHOLAR.  259 

thing  that  did  not  proceed  from  a  thought.  The 
scholar  has  a  deep  ideal  interest  in  the  moving  show 
around  him.  He  knew  the  motley  system  in  its 
egg.  We  have  —  have  we  not?  —  a  real  relation 
to  markets  and  brokers  and  currency  and  coin0 
"  Gold  and  silver,"  says  one  of  the  Platonists. 
"  grow  in  the  earth  from  the  celestial  gods,  —  an 
effluxion  from  them."  The  unmentionable  dollar 
itself  has  at  last  a  high  origin  in  moral  and  meta- 
physical nature.  Union  Pacific  stock  is  not  quite 
private  property,  but  the  quality  and  essence  of  the 
universe  is  in  that  also.  Have  we  less  interest  in 
ships  or  in  shops,  in  manual  work  or  in  household 
affairs ;  in  any  object  of  nature,  or  in  any  handi- 
work of  man ;  in  any  relation  of  life  or  custom  of 
society  ?  The  scholar  is  to  show,  in  each,  identity 
and  connexion ;  he  is  to  show  its  origin  in  the  brain 
of  man,  and  its  secret  history  and  issues.  He  is 
the  attorney  of  the  world,  and  can  never  be  super- 
fluous where  so  vast  a  variety  of  questions  are  ever 
coming  up  to  be  solved,  and  for  ages. 

I  proceed  to  say  that  the  allusions  just  now  made 
to  the  extent  of  his  duties,  the  manner  in  which 
every  day's  events  will  find  him  in  work,  may  show 
that  his  place  is  no  sinecure.  The  scholar,  when 
he  comes,  will  be  known  by  an  energy  that  will  an- 
imate all  who  see  him.  The  labor  of  ambition  and 
avarice  will  appear  fumbling  beside   his.     In  the 


260  THE  SCHOLAR. 

right  hands,  literature  is  not  resorted  to  as  a  con- 
solation, and  by  the  broken  and  decayed,  but  as  a 
decalogue.  In  this  country  we  are  fond  of  results 
and  of  short  ways  to  them ;  and  most  in  this 
department.  In  our  experiences,  learning  is  not 
learned,  nor  is  genius  wise.  The  name  of  the 
Scholar  is  taken  in  vain.  We  who  should  be  the 
channel  of  that  unweariable  Power  which  never 
sleeps,  must  give  our  diligence  no  holidays.  Other 
men  are  planting  and  building,  baking  and  tanning, 
running  and  sailing,  heaving  and  carrying,  each 
that  he  may  peacefully  execute  the  fine  function 
by  which  they  all  are  helped.  Shall  he  play,  whilst 
their  eyes  follow  him  from  far  with  reverence, 
attributing  to  him  the  delving  in  great  fields  of 
thought,  and  conversing  with  supernatural  allies? 
If  he  is  not  kindling  his  torch  or  collecting  oil,  he 
will  fear  to  go  by  a  workshop ;  he  will  not  dare  to 
hear  the  music  of  a  saw  or  plane ;  the  steam-engine 
will  reprimand,  the  steam-pipe  will  hiss  at  him ;  he 
cannot  look  a  blacksmith  in  the  eye ;  in  the  field 
he  will  be  shamed  by  mowers  and  reapers.  The 
speculative  man,  the  scholar,  is  the  right  hero.  He 
is  brave,  because  he  sees  the  omnipotence  of  that 
which  inspires  him.  Is  there  only  one  courage 
and  one  warfare?  I  cannot  manage  sword  and 
rifle ;  can  I  not  therefore  be  brave  ?  I  thought 
there  were  as  many  courages  as  men.     Is  an  armed 


THE  SCHOLAR.  261 

man  the  only  hero  ?  Is  a  man  only  the  breech  of  a 
gun  or  the  haft  of  a  bowie-knife  ?  Men  of  thought 
fail  in  fighting  down  malignity,  because  they  wear 
other  armor  than  their  own.  Let  them  decline 
henceforward  foreign  methods  and  foreign  cour= 
ages.  Let  them  do  that  which  they  can  do.  Let 
them  fight  by  their  strength,  not  by  their  weakness. 
It  seems  to  me  that  the  thoughtful  man  needs  no 
armor  but  this  —  concentration.  One  thing  is  for 
him  settled,  that  he  is  to  come  at  his  ends.  He  is 
not  there  to  defend  himself,  but  to  deliver  his  mes- 
sage ;  if  his  voice  is  clear,  then  clearly ;  if  husky, 
then  huskily ;  if  broken,  he  can  at  least  scream ;  gag 
him,  he  can  still  write  it ;  bruise,  mutilate  him,  cut 
off  his  hands  and  feet,  he  can  still  crawl  towards 
his  object  on  his  stumps.  It  is  the  corruption  of 
our  generation  that  men  value  a  long  life,  and  do 
not  esteem  life  simply  as  a  means  of  expressing  a 
sentiment. 

The  great  English  patriot  Algernon  Sidney  wrote 
to  his  father  from  his  prison  a  little  before  his  exe- 
cution :  "  I  have  ever  had  in  my  mind  that  when 
God  should  cast  me  into  such  a  condition  as  that  I 
cannot  save  my  life  but  by  doing  an  indecent  thing 
he  shows  me  the  time  has  come  when  I  should 
resign  it."  Beauty  belongs  to  the  sentiment,  and  is 
always  departing  from  those  who  depart  out  of  that. 
The  hero  rises  out  of  all  comparison  with  contempo- 


262  THE  SCHOLAR. 

raries  and  with  ages  of  men,  because  he  disesteems 
old  age,  and  lands,  and  money,  and  power,  and  will 
oppose  all  mankind  at  the  call  of  that  private  and 
perfect  Right  and  Beauty  in  which  he  lives. 

Man  is  a  torch  borne  in  the  wind.  The  ends  I 
have  hinted  at  made  the  scholar  or  spiritual  man 
indispensable  to  the  Republic  or  Commonwealth  of 
Man.  Nature  could  not  leave  herself  without  a 
seer  and  expounder.  But  he  could  not  see  or  teach 
without  organs.  The  same  necessity  then  that 
would  create  him  reappears  in  his  splendid  gifts. 
There  is  no  power  in  the  mind  but  in  turn  becomes 
an  instrument.  The  descent  of  genius  into  talents 
is  part  of  the  natural  order  and  history  of  the 
world.  The  incarnation  must  be.  We  cannot  eat 
the  granite  nor  drink  hydrogen.  They  must  be  de- 
compounded and  recompounded  into  corn  and  water 
before  they  can  enter  our  flesh.  There  is  a  great 
deal  of  spiritual  energy  in  the  universe,  but  it  is  not 
palpable  to  us  until  we  can  make  it  up  into  man. 
There  is  plenty  of  air,  but  it  is  worth  nothing  until 
by  gathering  it  into  sails  we  can  get  it  into  shape 
and  service  to  carry  us  and  our  cargo  across  the 
sea.  Then  it  is  paid  for  by  hundreds  of  thousands 
of  our  money.  Plenty  of  water  also,  sea  full,  sky 
full ;  who  cares  for  it  ?  But  when  we  can  get  it 
where  we  want  it,  and  in  measured  portions,  on  a 
mill-wheel,  or  boat-paddle,  we  will  buy  it  with  mill- 


THE  SCHOLAR.  263 

ions.  There  is  plenty  of  wild  azote  and  carbon 
unappropriated,  but  it  is  nought  till  we  have  made 
it  up  into  loaves  and  soup.  So  we  find  it  in  higher 
relations.  There  is  plenty  of  wild  wrath,  but  it 
steads  not  until  we  can  get  it  racked  off,  shall  I  say  ? 
and  bottled  into  persons  ;  a  little  pure,  and  not  too 
much,  to  every  head.  How  many  young  geniuses 
we  have  known,  and  none  but  ourselves  will  ever 
hear  of  them  for  want  in  them  of  a  little  talent ! 

Ah,  gentlemen,  I  own  I  love  talents  and  accom- 
plishments; the  feet  and  hands  of  genius.  As 
Burke  said,  "  it  is  not  only  our  duty  to  make  the 
right  known,  but  to  make  it  prevalent."  So  I  de- 
light to  see  the  Godhead  in  distribution  ;  to  see 
men  that  can  come  at  their  ends.  These  shrewd 
faculties  belong  to  man.  I  love  to  see  them  in  play, 
and  to  see  them  trained  :  this  memory  carrying  in 
its  caves  the  pictures  of  all  the  past,  and  rendering 
them  in  the  instant  when  they  can  serve  the  pos- 
sessor ;  —  the  craft  of  mathematical  combination, 
which  carries  a  working-plan  of  the  heavens  and  of 
the  earth  in  a  formula.  I  am  apt  to  believe,  with 
the  Emperor  Charles  V.,  that  "  as  many  languages 
as  a  man  knows,  so  many  times  is  he  a  man."  I 
like  to  see  a  man  of  that  virtue  that  no  obscurity 
or  disguise  can  conceal,  who  wins  all  souls  to  his 
way  of  thinking.  I  delight  in  men  adorned  and 
weaponed  with  manlike  arts,  who  could  alone,  or 


264  THE  SCHOLAR. 

with  a  few  like  them,  reproduce  Europe  and  Amer- 
ica, the  result  of  our  civilization. 

It  is  excellent  when  the  individual  is  ripened  to 
that  degree  that  he  touches  both  the  centre  and  the 
circumference,  so  that  he  is  not  only  widely  intelli- 
gent, but  carries  a  council  in  his  breast  for  the 
emergency  of  to-day  ;  and  alternates  the  contem- 
plation of  the  fact  in  pure  intellect,  with  the  total 
conversion  of  the  intellect  into  energy ;  Jove,  and 
the  thunderbolt  launched  from  his  hand.  Perhaps  I 
value  power  of  achievement  a  little  more  because  in 
America  there  seems  to  be  a  certain  indigence  in 
this  respect.  I  think  there  is  no  more  intellectual 
people  than  ours.  They  are  very  apprehensive  and 
curious.  But  there  is  a  sterility  of  talent.  These 
iron  personalities,  such  as  in  Greece  and  Italy  and 
once  in  England  were  formed  to  strike  fear  into 
kings  and  draw  the  eager  service  of  thousands, 
rarely  appear.  We  have  general  intelligence,  but 
no  Cyclop  arms.  A  very  little  intellectual  force 
makes  a  disproportionately  great  impression,  and 
when  one  observes  how  eagerly  our  people  enter- 
tain and  discuss  a  new  theory,  whether  home-born 
or  imported,  and  how  little  thought  operates  how 
great  an  effect,  one  would  draw  a  favorable  infer- 
ence as  to  their  intellectual  and  spiritual  tendencies. 
It  seems  as  if  two  or  three  persons  coming  who 
should  add  to  a  high  spiritual  aim  great  construc- 
tive energy,  would  carry  the  country  with  them. 


THE  SCHOLAR.  265 

In  making  this  claim  of  costly  accomplishments 
for  the  scholar,  I  chiefly  wish  to  infer  the  dignity 
of  his  work  by  the  lustre  of  his  appointments.  He 
is  not  cheaply  equipped.  The  universe  was  rifled 
to  furnish  him.  He  is  to  forge  out  of  coarsest  ores 
the  sharpest  weapons.  But  if  the  weapons  are  val- 
ued for  themselves,  if  his  talents  assume  an  inde- 
pendence, and  come  to  work  for  ostentation,  they 
cannot  serve  him.  It  was  said  of  an  eminent 
Frenchman,  that  "  he  was  drowned  in  his  talents." 
The  peril  of  every  fine  faculty  is  the  delight  of  play- 
ing with  it  for  pride.  Talent  is  commonly  devel- 
oped at  the  expense  of  character,  and  the  greater  it 
grows,  the  more  is  the  mischief  and  misleading ;  so 
that  presently  all  is  wrong,  talent  is  mistaken  for 
genius,  a  dogma  or  system  for  truth,  ambition  for 
greatness,  ingenuity  for  poetry,  sensuality  for  art ; 
and  the  young,  coming  up  with  innocent  hope,  and 
looking  around  them  at  education,  at  the  professions 
and  employments,  at  religious  and  literary  teachers 
and  teaching,  —  finding  that  nothing  outside  corre- 
sponds to  the  noble  order  in  the  soul,  are  confused, 
and  become  skeptical  and  forlorn.  Hope  is  taken 
from  youth  unless  there  be,  by  the  grace  of  God, 
sufficient  vigor  in  their  instinct  to  say,  "  All  is 
wrong  and  human  invention.  I  declare  anew  from 
Heaven  that  truth  exists  new  and  beautiful  and 
profitable  forevermore."  Order  is  heaven's  first  law. 


266  THE  SCHOLAR. 

These  gifts,  these  senses,  these  facilities  are  excel- 
lent as  long  as  subordinated ;  all  wasted  and  mis- 
chievous when  they  assume  to  lead  and  not  obey. 
What  is  the  use  of  strength  or  cunning  or  beauty, 
or  musical  voice,  or  birth,  or  breeding,  or  money,  to 
a  maniac  ?  Yet  society,  in  which  we  live,  is  sub- 
ject to  fits  of  frenzy ;  sometimes  is  for  an  age  to- 
gether a  maniac,  with  birth,  breeding,  beauty,  cun- 
ning, strength  and  money.  And  there  is  but  one 
defence  against  this  principle  of  chaos,  and  that  is 
the  principle  of  order,  or  brave  return  at  all  hours 
to  an  infinite  common-sense,  to  the  mother-wit,  to 
the  wise  instinct,  to  the  pure  intellect. 

When  a  man  begins  to  dedicate  liimself  to  a  par- 
ticular function,  as  his  logical,  or  his  remembering, 
or  his  oratorical,  or  his  arithmetical  skill ;  the  ad- 
vance of  his  character  and  genius  pauses ;  he  has 
run  to  the  end  of  his  line ;  seal  the  book ;  the  de- 
velopment of  that  mind  is  arrested.  The  scholar 
is  lost  in  the  showman.  Society  is  babyish,  and  is 
dazzled  and  deceived  by  the  weapon,  without  in- 
quiring into  the  cause  for  which  it  is  drawn ;  like 
boys  by  the  drums  and  colors  of  the  troops. 

The  objection  of  men  of  the  world  to  what  they 
call  the  morbid  intellectual  tendency  in  our  young 
men  at  present,  is  not  a  hostility  to  their  truth,  but 
to  this,  its  shortcoming,  that  the  idealistic  views  un- 
lit their  children  for  business  in  their  sense,  and  do 


THE  SCHOLAR.  267 

not  qualify  them  for  any  complete  life  of  a  better 
kind.  They  threaten  the  validity  of  contracts,  but 
do  not  prevail  so  far  as  to  establish  the  new  king- 
dom which  shall  supersede  contracts,  oaths,  and 
property.  "  We  have  seen  to  weariness  what  you 
cannot  do  ;  now  show  us  what  you  can  and  will  do," 
asks  the  practical  man,  and  with  perfect  reason. 

We  are  not  afraid  of  new  truth,  —  of  truth 
never,  new,  or  old,  —  no,  but  of  a  counterfeit. 
Everybody  hates  imbecility  and  shortcoming,  not 
new  methods.  The  astronomer  is  not  ridiculous 
inasmuch  as  he  is  an  astronomer,  but  inasmuch  as 
he  is  not  an  astronomer.  Be  that  you  are :  be  that 
cheerly  and  sovereignly.  Plotinus  makes  no  apol- 
ogies, he  says  roundly,  "the  knowledge  of  the  senses 
is  truly  ludicrous."  "  Body  and  its  properties  be- 
long to  the  region  of  nonentity,  as  if  more  of  body 
was  necessarily  produced  where  a  defect  of  being 
happens  in  a  greater  degree."  "  Matter,"  says 
Plutarch,  "  is  privation."  Let  the  man  of  ideas  at 
this  hour  be  as  direct,  and  as  fully  committed. 
Have  you  a  thought  in  your  heart  ?  There  was 
never  such  need  of  it  as  now.  As  we  read  the 
newspapers,  as  we  see  the  effrontery  with  which 
money  and  power  carry  their  ends  and  ride  over 
honesty  and  good-meaning,  patriotism  and  religion 
seem  to  shriek  like  ghosts.  We  will  not  speak  for 
them,  because  to  speak  for  them  seems  so  weak  and 


268  THE  SCHOLAR. 

hopeless.  We  will  hold  fast  our  opinion  and  die 
in  silence.  But  a  true  orator  will  make  us  feel 
that  the  states  and  kingdoms,  the  senators,  lawyers 
and  rich  men  are  caterpillars'  webs  and  caterpillars, 
when  seen  in  the  light  of  this  despised  and  imbecile 
truth.  Then  we  feel  what  cowards  we  have  been. 
Truth  alone  is  great.  The  orator  too  becomes  a 
fool  and  a  shadow  before  this  light  which  lightens 
through  him.  It  shines  backward  and  forward, 
diminishes  and  annihilates  everybody,  and  the  pro- 
phet so  gladly  feels  his  personality  lost  in  this  vic- 
torious life.  The  spiritual  nature  exhibits  itself  so 
in  its  counteraction  to  any  accumulation  of  material 
force.  There  is  no  mass  that  can  be  a  counter- 
weight for  it.  This  makes  one  man  good  against 
mankind.  This  is  the  secret  of  eloquence,  for  it  is 
the  end  of  eloquence  in  a  half -hour's  discourse,  — 
perhaps  by  a  few  sentences,  —  to  persuade  a  multi- 
tude of  persons  to  renounce  their  opinions,  and 
change  the  course  of  life.  They  go  forth  not  the 
men  they  came  in,  but  shriven,  convicted,  and  con- 
verted. 

We  have  many  revivals  of  religion.  We  have 
had  once  what  was  called  the  Eevival  of  Letters.  I 
wish  to  see  a  revival  of  the  human  mind  :  to  see 
men's  sense  of  duty  extend  to  the  cherishing  and 
use  of  their  intellectual  powers :  their  religion 
should  go  with  their  thought  and  hallow  it.     Who- 


THE  SCHOLAR.  269 

soever  looks  with  heed  into  his  thoughts  will  find 
that  our  science  of  the  mind  has  not  got  far.  He 
will  find  there  is  somebody  within  him  that  knows 
more  than  he  does,  a  certain  dumb  life  in  life ;  a 
simple  wisdom  behind  all  acquired  wisdom ;  some- 
what not  educated  or  educable  ;  not  altered  or  al- 
terable ;  a  mother-wit  which  does  not  learn  by 
experience  or  by  books,  but  knew  it  all  already ; 
makes  no  progress,  but  was  wise  in  youth  as  in  age. 
More  or  less  clouded  it  yet  resides  the  same  in  all, 
saying  Ay,  ay,  or  No,  no  to  every  proposition.  Yet 
its  grand  Ay  and  its  grand  No  are  more  musical 
than  all  eloquence.  Nobody  has  found  the  limit 
of  its  knowledge.  Whatever  object  is  brought  be- 
fore it  is  already  well  known  to  it.  Its  justice  is 
perfect  ;  its  look  is  catholic  and  universal,  its  light 
ubiquitous  like  the  sun.  It  does  not  put  forth  or- 
gans, it  rests  in  presence :  yet  trusted  and  obeyed 
in  happy  natures  it  becomes  active  and  salient,  and 
makes  new  means  for  its  great  ends. 

The  scholar  then  is  unfurnished  who  has  only 
literary  weapons.  He  ought  to  have  as  many  tal- 
ents as  he  can ;  memory,  arithmetic,  practical  power, 
manners,  temper,  lion-heart,  are  all  good  things, 
and  if  he  has  none  of  them  he  can  still  manage,  if 
he  have  the  main-mast,  —  if  he  is  anything.  But 
he  must  have  the  resource  of  resources,  and  be 
planted  on  necessity.      For  the  sure  months  are 


270  THE  SCHOLAR. 

bringing  him  to  an  examination-day  in  which  noth- 
.  ing  is  remitted  or  excused,  and  for  which  no  tutor, 
no  book,  no  lectures,  and  almost  no  preparation 
can  be  of  the  least  avail.  He  will  have  to  answer 
certain  questions,  which,  I  must  plainly  tell  you, 
cannot  be  staved  off.  For  all  men,  all  women, 
Time,  your  country,  your  condition,  the  invisible 
world,  are  the  interrogators  :  Who  are  you  f  What 
do  you  f  Can  you  obtain  what  you  wish  f  Is 
there  method  in  your  consciousness?  Can  you 
see  tendency  in  your  life  f  Can  you  help  any 
soul  ? 

Can  he  answer  these  questions  ?  can  he  dispose 
of  them  ?  Happy  if  you  can  answer  them  mutely 
in  the  order  and  disposition  of  your  life  !  Happy 
for  more  than  yourself,  a  benefactor  of  men,  if  you 
can  answer  them  in  works  of  wisdom,  art,  or  poetry ; 
bestowing  on  the  general  mind  of  men  organic  cre- 
ations, to  be  the  guidance  and  delight  of  all  who 
know  them.  These  questions  speak  to  Genius,  to 
that  power  which  is  underneath  and  greater  than 
all  talent,  and  which  proceeds  out  of  the  constitu- 
tion of  every  man :  to  Genius,  which  is  an  emana- 
tion of  that  it  tells  of ;  whose  private  counsels  are 
not  tinged  with  selfishness,  but  are  laws.  Men  of 
talent  fill  the  eye  with  their  pretension.  They  go 
out  into  some  camp  of  their  own,  and  noisily  per- 
suade society  that  this  thing  which  they  do  is  the 


THE  SCHOLAR.  271 

needful  cause  of  all  men.  They  have  talents  for 
contention,  and  they  nourish  a  small  difference 
into  a  loud  quarrel.  But  the  world  is  wide,  nobody 
will  go  there  after  to-morrow.  The  gun  they  have 
pointed  can  defend  nothing  but  itself,  nor  itself  any 
longer  than  the  man  is  by.  What  is  the  use  of  ar- 
tificial positions?  But  Genius  has  no  taste  for 
weaving  sand,  or  for  any  trifling,  but  flings  itself 
on  real  elemental  things,  which  are  powers,  self-de- 
fensive ;  which  first  subsist,  and  then  resist  unwea- 
riably  forevermore  all  that  opposes.  Genius  has 
truth  and  clings  to  it,  so  that  what  it  says  and  does 
is  not  in  a  by-road,  visited  only  by  curiosity,  but  on 
the  great  highways  of  nature,  which  were  before 
the  Appian  Way,  and  which  all  souls  must  travel. 
Genius  delights  only  in  statements  which  are  them- 
selves true,  which  attack  and  wound  any  who  op- 
poses them,  whether  he  who  brought  them  here  re- 
mains here  or  not ;  —  which  are  live  men,  and  do 
daily  declare  fresh  war  against  all  falsehood  and 
custom,  and  will  not  let  an  offender  go  ;  which  so- 
ciety cannot  dispose  of  or  forget,  but  which  abide 
there  and  will  not  down  at  anybody's  bidding,  but 
stand  frowning  and  formidable,  and  will  and  must 
be  finally  obeyed  and  done. 

The  scholar  must  be  ready  for  bad  weather,  pov- 
erty, insult,  weariness,  repute  of  failure,  and  many 
vexations.     He  must   have  a  great  patience,  and 


272  THE  SCHOLAR. 

ride  at  anchor  and  vanquish  every  enemy  whom  his 
small  arms  cannot  reach,  by  the  grand  resistance  of 
submission,  of  ceasing  to  do.  He  is  to  know  that 
in  the  last  resort  he  is  not  here  to  work,  but  to  be 
worked  upon.  He  is  to  eat  insult,  drink  insult,  be 
clothed  and  shod  in  insult  until  he  has  learned  that 
this  bitter  bread  and  shameful  dress  is  also  whole- 
some and  warm,  is  in  short  indifferent ;  is  of  the 
same  chemistry  as  praise  and  fat  living ;  that  they 
also  are  disgrace  and  soreness  to  him  who  has  them. 
I  think  much  may  be  said  to  discourage  and  dis- 
suade the  young  scholar  from  his  career.  Freely 
be  that  said.  Dissuade  all  you  can  from  the  lists. 
Sift  the  wheat,  frighten  away  the  lighter  souls. 
Let  us  keep  only  the  heavy-armed.  Let  those 
come  who  cannot  but  come,  and  who  see  that  there 
is  no  choice  here,  no  advantage  and  no  disadvan- 
tage compared  with  other  careers.  For  the  great 
Necessity  is  our  patron,  who  distributes  sun  and 
shade  after  immutable  laws. 

Yes,  he  has  his  dark  days,  he  has  weakness,  he 
nas  waitings,  he  has  bad  company,  he  is  pelted  by 
storms  of  cares,  untuning  cares,  untuning  company. 
Well,  let  him  meet  them.  He  has  not  consented  to 
the  frivolity,  nor  to  the  dispersion.  The  practical 
aim  is  forever  higher  than  the  literary  aim.  He 
shall  not  submit  to  degradation,  but  shall  bear  these 
crosses  with  what  grace  he  can.     He  is  still  to  d& 


THE  SCHOLAR.  273 

cline  how  many  glittering  opportunities,  and  to  re- 
treat, and  wait.  So  shall  you  find  in  this  penury 
and  absence  of  thought  a  purer  splendor  than  ever 
clothed  the  exhibitions  of  wit.  I  invite  you  not  to 
cheap  joys,  to  the  flutter  of  gratified  vanity,  to  a 
sleek  and  rosy  comfort ;  no,  but  to  bareness,  to 
power,  to  enthusiasm,  to  the  mountain  of  vision,  to 
true  and  natural  supremacy,  to  the  society  of  the 
great,  and  to  love.  Give  me  bareness  and  poverty 
so  that  I  know  them  as  the  sure  heralds  of  the 
Muse.  Not  in  plenty,  not  in  a  thriving,  well-to-do 
condition,  she  delighteth.  He  that  would  sacrifice 
at  her  altar  must  not  leave  a  few  flowers,  an  apple, 
or  some  symbolic  gift.  No ;  he  must  relinquish  or- 
chards and  gardens,  prosperity  and  convenience ; 
he  may  live  on  a  heath  without  trees ;  sometimes 
hungry,  and  sometimes  rheumatic  with  cold.  The 
fire  retreats  and  concentrates  within  into  a  pure 
flame,  pure  as  the  stars  to  which  it  mounts. 

But,  gentlemen,  there  is  plainly  no  end  to  these 
expansions.  I  have  exhausted  your  patience,  and 
I  have  only  begun.  I  had  perhaps  wiselier  adhered 
to  my  first  purpose  of  confining  my  illustration  to 
a  single  topic,  but  it  is  so  much  easier  to  say  many 
things  than  to  explain  one.  Well,  you  will  see  the 
drift  of  all  my  thoughts,  this  namely  —  that  the 
scholar  must  be  much  more  than  a  scholar,  that  his 
ends  give  value  to  every  means,  but  he  is  to  subdue 

VOL.  X.  18 


274  THE  SCHOLAR. 

and  keep  down  Ms  methods ;  that  his  use  of  books 
is  occasional,  and  infinitely  subordinate  ;  that  he 
should  read  a  little  proudly,  as  one  who  knows  the 
original,  and  cannot  therefore  very  highly  value 
the  copy.  In  like  manner  he  is  to  hold  lightly 
every  tradition,  every  opinion,  every  person,  out  of 
his  piety  to  that  Eternal  Spirit  which  dwells  unex- 
pressed with  him.  He  shall  think  very  highly  of 
his  destiny.  He  is  here  to  know  the  secret  of  Gen- 
ius ;  to  become,  not  a  reader  of  poetry,  but  Homer, 
Dante,  Milton,  Shakspeare,  Swedenborg,  in  the 
fountain,  through  that.  If  one  man  could  impart 
his  faith  to  another,  if  I  could  prevail  to  commu- 
nicate the  incommunicable  mysteries,  you  should 
see  the  breadth  of  your  realm  ;  —  that  ever  as  you 
ascend  your  proper  and  native  path,  you  receive 
the  keys  of  Nature  and  history,  and  rise  on  the  same 
stairs  to  science  and  to  joy. 


PLUTARCH. 


The  soul 
Shall  have  society  of  its  own  rank : 
Be  great,  be  true,  and  all  the  Scipios, 
The  Catos,  the  wise  patriots  of  Rome, 
Shall  flock  to  you  and  tarry  by  your  side 
And  comfort  you  with  their  high  company. 


PLUTARCH.1 


It  is  remarkable  that  of  an  author  so  familiar  as 
Plutarch,  not  only  to  scholars,  but  to  all  reading 
men,  and  whose  history  is  so  easily  gathered  from 
his  works,  no  accurate  memoir  of  his  life,  not  even 
the  dates  of  his  birth  and  death,  should  have  come 
down  to  us.  Strange  that  the  writer  of  so  many 
illustrious  biographies  should  wait  so  long  for  his 
own.  It  is  agreed  that  he  was  born  about  the  year 
50  of  the  Christian  era.  He  has  been  represented 
as  having  been  the  tutor  of  the  Emperor  Trajan, 
as  dedicating  one  of  his  books  to  him,  as  living 
long  in  Rome  in  great  esteem,  as  having  received 
from  Trajan  the  consular  dignity,  and  as  having 
been  appointed  by  him  the  governor  of  Greece. 
He  was  a  man  whose  real  superiority  had  no  need 
of  these  flatteries.  Meantime,  the  simple  truth  is, 
that  he  was  not  the  tutor  of  Trajan,  that  he  dedi- 
cated no  book  to  him,  was  not  consul  in  Rome, 
nor  governor  of  Greece ;  appears  never  to  have 
been  in  Rome  but  on  two  occasions,  and  then  on 
1  This  paper  was  originally  printed  as  an  introduction  to 
Plutarch's  Morals,  edited  by  Professor  William  W.  Goodwin, 
and  published,  in  1871,  by  Messrs.  Little,  Brown  &  Co., 
through  whose  courtesy  it  is  included  in  this  edition. 


278  PLUTARCH. 

business  of  the  people  of  Lis  native  city,  Chseronea  ; 
and  though  he  found  or  made  friends  at  Rome,  and 
read  lectures  to  some  friends  or  scholars,  he  did  not 
know  or  learn  the  Latin  language  there ;  with  one 
or  two  doubtful  exceptions,  never  quotes  a  Latin 
book  ;  and  though  the  contemporary,  in  his  youth 
or  in  his  old  age,  of  Persius,  Juvenal,  Lucan  and 
Seneca,  of  Quintilian,  Martial,  Tacitus,  Suetonius, 
Pliny  the  Elder  and  the  Younger,  he  does  not  cite 
them,  and,  in  return,  his  name  is  never  mentioned 
by  any  Roman  writer.  It  would  seem  that  the  com- 
munity of  letters  and  of  personal  news  was  even 
more  rare  at  that  day  than  the  want  of  printing,  of 
railroads  and  telegraphs,  would  suggest  to  us. 

But  this  neglect  by  his  contemporaries  has  been 
compensated  by  an  immense  popularity  in  modern 
nations.  Whilst  his  books  were  never  known  to 
the  world  in  their  own  Greek  tongue,  it  is  curious 
that  the  "  Lives  "  were  translated  and  printed  in 
Latin,  thence  into  Italian,  French,  and  English, 
more  than  a  century  before  the  original  "  Works  " 
were  yet  printed.  For  whilst  the  "  Lives  "  were 
translated  in  Rome  in  1470,  and  the  "  Morals," 
part  by  part,  soon  after,  the  first  printed  edition 
of  the  Greek  "  Works  "  did  not  appear  until  1572. 
Hardly  current  in  his  own  Greek,  these  found 
learned  interpreters  in  the  scholars  of  Germany, 
Spain  and  Italy.     In  France,  in  the  middle  of  the 


PLUTARCH.  279 

most  turbulent  civil  wars,  Amyot's  translation  awak- 
ened general  attention.     His  genial  version  of  tho 
"Lives"  in  1559,  of  the  "Morals"  in  1572,  had 
signal  success.     King  Henry  IV.  wrote  to  his  wife, 
Marie  de  Medicis  :  "  Vive  Dieu.     As  God  liveth, 
you  could  not  have  sent  me  anything  which  could 
be  more  agreeable  than  the  news  of  the  pleasure 
you  have  taken  in  this  reading.     Plutarch  always 
delights  me  with  a  fresh  novelty.     To  love  him  is 
to  love  me  ;  for  he  has  been  long  time  the  instructor 
of  my  youth.     My  good  mother,  to  whom  I  owe  all, 
and  who  would  not  wish,  she  said,  to  see  her  son  an 
illustrious  dunce,  put  this  book  into  my  hands  al- 
most when  I  was  a  child  at  the  breast.     It  has  been 
like  my  conscience,  and  has  whispered  in  my  ear 
many  good  suggestions  and  maxims  for  my  conduct 
and  the  government  of  my  affairs."     Still  earlier, 
Rabelais  cites  him  with  due  respect.     Montaigne, 
in  1589,  says  :  "  We  dunces  had  been  lost,  had  not 
this  book  raised  us  out  of  the  dirt.     By  this  favor 
of  his  we  dare  now  speak  and  write.     The  ladies 
are  able  to  read  to  schoolmasters.      JTis  our  brevi- 
ary."    Montesquieu  drew  from  him  his  definition 
of  law,  and,  in  his  Pensees,  declares,  "  I  am  always 
charmed  with  Plutarch ;  in  his  writings  are  circum- 
stances attached  to  persons,  which  give  great  pleas- 
ure ;  "  and  adds  examples.      Saint  Evremond  read 
Plutarch  to  the  great  Conde  under  a  tent.     Rollin, 


280  PLUTARCH. 

so  long  the  historian  of  antiquity  for  France,  drew 
unhesitatingly  his  history  from  him.  Yoltaire  hon- 
ored him,  and  Rousseau  acknowledged  him  as  his 
master.  In  England,  Sir  Thomas  North  translated 
the  "  Lives  "  in  1579,  and  Holland  the  "  Morals  " 
in  1603,  in  time  to  be  used  by  Shakspeare  in  his 
plays,  and  read  by  Bacon,  Dryden,  and  Cudworth. 

Then,  recently,  there  has  been  a  remarkable  re- 
vival, in  France,  in  the  taste  for  Plutarch  and  his 
contemporaries ;  led,  we  may  say,  by  the  eminent 
critic  Sainte-Beuve.  M.  Octave  Greard,  in  a  crit- 
ical work  on  the  "  Morals,"  has  carefully  correct- 
ed the  popular  legends  and  constructed  from  the 
works  of  Plutarch  himself  his  true  biography.  M. 
Leveque  has  given  an  exposition  of  his  moral  phi- 
losophy, under  the  title  of  "A  Physician  of  the 
{Soul,"  in  the  Revue  des  Deux  Mondes  ;  and  M.  C. 
Martha,  chapters  on  the  genius  of  Marcus  Aurelius, 
of  Persius,  and  Lucretius,  in  the  same  journal; 
whilst  M.  Fustel  de  Coulanges  has  explored  from 
its  roots  in  the  Aryan  race,  then  in  their  Greek 
and  Roman  descendants,  the  primeval  religion  of 
the  household. 

Plutarch  occupies  a  unique  place  in  literature  as 
an  encyclopaedia  of  Greek  and  Roman  antiquity. 
Whatever  is  eminent  in  fact  or  in  fiction,  in  opin- 
ion, in  character,  in  institutions,  in  science  —  natu- 
ral, moral,  or  metaphysical,  or  in  memorable  say* 


PLUTARCH.  281 

ings,  drew  his  attention  and  came  to  his  pen  with 
more  or  less  fulness  of  record.  He  is,  among  prose 
writers,  what  Chaucer  is  among  English  poets,  a  rep 
ertory  for  those  who  want  the  story  without  search 
ing  for  it  at  first  hand,  —  a  compend  of  all  accepted 
traditions.  And  all.  this  without  any  supreme  in. 
tellectual  gifts.  He  is  not  a  profound  mind ;  not  a 
master  in  any  science ;  not  a  lawgiver,  like  Lycur- 
gus  or  Solon  ;  not  a  metaphysician,  like  Parmenides, 
Plato,  or  Aristotle  ;  not  the  founder  of  any  sect  or 
community,  like  Pythagoras  or  Zeno  ;  not  a  natural- 
ist, like  Pliny  or  Linnaeus  ;  not  a  leader  of  the  mind 
of  a  generation,  like  Plato  or  Goethe.  But  if  he 
had  not  the  highest  powers,  he  was  yet  a  man  of 
rare  gifts.  He  had  that  universal  sympathy  with 
genius  which  makes  all  its  victories  his  own  ;  though 
he  never  used  verse,  he  had  many  qualities  of  the 
poet  in  the  power  of  his  imagination,  the  speed  of 
his  mental  associations,  and  his  sharp,  objective 
eyes.  But  what  specially  marks  him,  he  is  a  chief 
example  of  the  illumination  of  the  intellect  by  the 
force  of  morals.  Though  the  most  amiable  of  boon- 
companions,  this  generous  religion  gives  him  aper- 
gus  like  Goethe's. 

Plutarch  was  well-born,  well-taught,  well-condi- 
tioned ;  a  self-respecting,  amiable  man,  who  knew 
how  to  better  a  good  education  by  travels,  by  de- 
votion to  affairs  private  and  public ;  a  master  of  an- 


282  PLUTARCH. 

cient  culture,  he  read  books  with  a  just  criticism; 
eminently  social,  he  was  a  king  in  his  own  house, 
surrounded  himself  with  select  friends,  and  knew 
the  high  value  of  good  conversation  ;  and  declares  in 
a  letter  written  to  his  wife  that  "  he  finds  scarcely 
an  erasure,  as  in  a  book  well-written,  in  the  happi- 
ness of  his  life." 

The  range  of  mind  makes  the  glad  writer.  The 
reason  of  Plutarch's  vast  popularity  is  his  human- 
ity. A  man  of  society,  of  affairs  ;  upright,  practi- 
cal ;  a  good  son,  husband,  father,  and  friend,  —  he 
has  a  taste  for  common  life,  and  knows  the  court, 
the  camp  and  the  judgment-hall,  but  also  the  forge, 
farm,  kitchen  and  cellar,  and  every  utensil  and  use, 
and  with  a  wise  man's  or  a  poet's  eye.  Thought  de- 
fends him  from  any  degradation.  He  does  not  lose 
his  way,  for  the  attractions  are  from  within,  not  from 
without.  A  poet  in  verse  or  prose  must  have  a  sen- 
suous eye,  but  an  intellectual  co-perception.  Plu- 
tarch's memory  is  full,  and  his  horizon  wide.  Noth- 
ing touches  man  but  he  feels  to  be  his ;  he  is  toler- 
ant even  of  vice,  if  he  finds  it  genial ;  enough  a  man 
of  the  world  to  give  even  the  Devil  his  due,  and 
would  have  hugged  Kobert  Burns,  when  he  cried  :  — 

"  O  wad  ye  tak'  a  thought  and  mend!  " 
He  is  a  philosopher  with  philosophers,  a  naturalist 
with  naturalists,  and  sufficiently  a  mathematician 
to  leave  some  of  his  readers,  now  and  then,  at  a  long 


PLUTARCH.  283 

distance  behind  him,  or  respectfully  skipping  to  the 
next  chapter.  But  this  scholastic  omniscience  of 
our  author  engages  a  new  respect,  since  they  hope 
he  understands  his  own  diagram. 

He  perpetually  suggests  Montaigne,  who  was  the 
best  reader  he  has  ever  found,  though  Montaigne 
excelled  his  master  in  the  point  and  surprise  of  his 
sentences.  Plutarch  had  a  religion  which  Mon- 
taigne wanted,  and  which  defends  him  from  wan- 
tonness ;  and  though  Plutarch  is  as  plain-spoken, 
his  moral  sentiment  is  always  pure.  What  better 
praise  has  any  writer  received  than  he  whom  Mon- 
taigne finds  "  frank  in  giving  things,  not  words," 
dryly  adding,  "  it  vexes  me  that  he  is  so  exposed  to 
the  spoil  of  those  that  are  conversant  with  him." 
It  is  one  of  the  felicities  of  literary  history,  the  tie 
which  inseparably  couples  these  two  names  across 
fourteen  centuries.  Montaigne,  whilst  he  grasps 
Etienne  de  la  Boece  with  one  hand,  reaches  back 
the  other  to  Plutarch.  These  distant  friendships 
charm  us,  and  honor  all  the  parties,  and  make  the 
best  example  of  the  universal  citizenship  and  frater- 
nity of  the  human  mind. 

I  do  not  know  where  to  find  a  book  —  to  borrow 
a  phrase  of  Ben  Jonson's  —  "  so  rammed  with  life," 
and  this  in  chapters  chiefly  ethical,  which  are  so 
prone  to  be  heavy  and  sentimental.  No  poet  could 
illustrate  his  thought  with  more  novel  or  striking 


284  PLUTARCH. 

similes  or  happier  anecdotes.  His  style  is  real- 
istic, picturesque  and  varied;  his  sharp  objective 
eyes  seeing  everything  that  moves,  shines,  or  threat- 
ens in  nature  or  art,  or  thought  or  dreams.  In- 
deed, twilights,  shadows,  omens  and  spectres  have 
a  charm  for  him.  He  believes  in  witchcraft  and 
the  evil  eye,  in  demons  and  ghosts,  —  but  prefers, 
if  you  please,  to  talk  of  these  in  the  morning.  His 
vivacity  and  abundance  never  leave  him  to  loiter 
or  pound  on  an  incident.  I  admire  his  rapid  and 
crowded  style,  as  if  he  had  such  store  of  anecdotes 
of  his  heroes  that  he  is  forced  to  suppress  more 
than  he  recounts,  in  order  to  keep  up  with  the  hast- 
ing history. 

His  surprising  merit  is  the  genial  facility  with 
which  he  deals  with  his  manifold  topics.  There  is 
no  trace  of  labor  or  pain.  He  gossips  of  heroes, 
philosophers  and  poets  ;  of  virtues  and  genius  ;  of 
love  and  fate  and  empires.  It  is  for  his  pleasure 
that  he  recites  all  that  is  best  in  his  reading :  he 
prattles  history.  But  he  is  no  courtier,  and  no 
Boswell :  he  is  ever  manly,  far  from  fawning,  and 
would  be  welcome  to  the  sages  and  warriors  he  re- 
ports, as  one  having  a  native  right  to  admire  and 
recount  these  stirring  deeds  and  speeches.  I  find 
him  a  better  teacher  of  rhetoric  than  any  modern. 
His  superstitions  are  poetic,  aspiring,  affirmative. 
A  poet   might    rhyme    all  day  with  hints    drawn 


PLUTARCH.  285 

from  Plutarch,  page  on  page.  No  doubt,  this  su- 
perior suggestion  for  the  modern  reader  owes  much 
to  the  foreign  air,  the  Greek  wine,  the  religion  and 
history  of  antique  heroes.  Thebes,  Sparta,  Athens 
and  Rome  charm  us  away  from  the  disgust  of  the 
passing  hour.  But  his  own  cheerfulness  and  rude 
health  are  also  magnetic.  In  his  immense  quota- 
tion and  allusion  we  quickly  cease  to  discriminate 
between  what  he  quotes  and  what  he  invents.  We 
sail  on  his  memory  into  the  ports  of  every  nation, 
enter  into  every  private  property,  and  do  not  stop 
to  discriminate  owners,  but  give  him  the  praise  of 
all.  'T  is  all  Plutarch,  by  right  of  eminent  domain, 
and  all  property  vests  in  this  emperor.  This  facil- 
ity and  abundance  make  the  joy  of  his  narrative, 
and  he  is  read  to  the  neglect  of  more  careful  histo- 
rians. Yet  he  inspires  a  curiosity,  sometimes  makes 
a  necessity,  to  read  them.  He  disowns  any  attempt 
to  rival  Thucydides ;  but  I  suppose  he  has  a  hun- 
dred readers  where  Thucydides  finds  one,  and  Thu- 
cydides must  often  thank  Plutarch  for  that  one. 
He  has  preserved  for  us  a  multitude  of  precious 
sentences,  in  prose  or  verse,  of  authors  whose  books 
are  lost  ;  and  these  embalmed  fragments,  through 
his  loving  selection  alone,  have  come  to  be  proverbs 
of  later  mankind.  I  hope  it  is  cnly  my  immense 
ignorance  that  makes  me  believe  that  they  do  not 
survive  out  of  his  pages,  - —  not  only  Thespis,  Pole- 


286  PLUTARCH. 

mos,  Enphorion,  Ariston,  Evenus,  etc.,  but  frag- 
ments of  Menander  and  Pindar.  At  all  events,  it 
is  in  reading  the  fragments  he  has  saved  from  lost 
authors  that  I  have  hailed  another  example  of  the 
sacred  care  which  has  unrolled  in  our  times,  and 
still  searches  and  unrolls  papyri  from  ruined  libra- 
ries and  buried  cities,  and  has  drawn  attention  to 
what  an  ancient  might  call  the  politeness  of  Fate, 
—  we  will  say,  more  advisedly,  the  benign  Provi- 
dence which  uses  the  violence  of  war,  of  earthquakes 
and  changed  water-courses,  to  save  underground 
through  barbarous  ages  the  relics  of  ancient  art, 
and  thus  allows  us  to  witness  the  upturning  of  the 
alphabets  of  old  races,  and  the  deciphering  of  for- 
gotten languages,  so  to  complete  the  annals  of  the 
forefathers  of  Asia,  Africa  and  Europe. 

His  delight  in  poetry  makes  him  cite  with  joy 
the  speech  of  Gorgias,  "  that  the  tragic  poet  who 
deceived  was  juster  than  he  who  deceived  not,  and 
he  that  was  deceived  was  wiser  than  he  who  was 
not  deceived." 

It  is  a  consequence  of  this  poetic  trait  in  his 
mind,  that  I  confess  that,  in  reading  him,  I  em- 
brace the  particulars,  and  carry  a  faint  memory  of 
the  argument  or  general  design  of  the  chapter ;  but 
he  is  not  less  welcome,  and  he  leaves  the  reader 
with  a  relish  and  a  necessity  for  completing  his 
studies.     Many  examples  might  be  cited  of  ner- 


PLUTARCH.  287 

vous  expression  and  happy  allusion,  that  indicate  a 
poet  and  an  orator,  though  he  is  not  ambitious  of 
these  titles,  and  cleaves  to  the  security  of  prose  nar- 
rative, and  only  shows  his  intellectual  sympathy 
with  these  ;  yet  I  cannot  forbear  to  cite  one  or  two 
sentences  which  none  who  reads  them  will  forget. 
In  treating  of  the  style  of  the  Pythian  Oracle,  he 
says : — 

"  Do  you  not  observe,  some  one  will  say,  what 
a  grace  there  is  in  Sappho's  measures,  and  how 
they  delight  and  tickle  the  ears  and  fancies  of  the 
hearers  ?  Whereas  the  Sibyl,  with  her  frantic 
grimaces,  uttering  sentences  altogether  thoughtful 
and  serious,  neither  fucused  nor  perfumed,  contin- 
ues her  voice  a  thousand  years  through  the  favor  of 
the  Divinity  that  speaks  within  her." 

Another  gives  an  insight  into  his  mystic  tenden- 
cies :  — 

"  Early  this  morning,  asking  Epaminondas  about 
the  manner  of  Lysis's  burial,  I  found  that  Lysis 
had  taught  him  as  far  as  the  incommunicable  mys- 
teries of  our  sect,  and  that  the  same  Daemon  that 
waited  on  Lysis,  presided  over  him,  if  I  can  guess 
at  the  pilot  from  the  sailing  of  the  ship.  The  paths 
of  life  are  large,  but  in  few  are  men  directed  by  the 
Daemons.  When  Theanor  had  said  this,  he  looked 
attentively  on  Epaminondas,  as  if  he  designed  a 
fresh  search  into  his  nature  and  inclinations." 


288  PLUTARCH. 

And  here  is  his  sentiment  on  superstition,  some* 
what  condensed  in  Lord  Bacon's  citation  of  it :  "I 
had  rather  a  great  deal  that  men  should  say,  There 
was  no  such  man  at  all  as  Plutarch,  than  that  they 
should  say  that  there  was  one  Plutarch  that  would 
eat  up  his  children  as  soon  as  they  were  born,  as 
the  poets  speak  of  Saturn." 

The  chapter  "  On  Fortune  "  should  be  read  by 
poets,  and  other  wise  men ;  and  the  vigor  of  his 
pen  appears  in  the  chapter  "  Whether  the  Atheni- 
ans were  more  Warlike  or  Learned,"  and  in  his 
attack  upon  Usurers. 

There  is,  of  course,  a  wide  difference  of  time 
in  the  writing  of  these  discourses,  and  so  in  their 
merit.  Many  of  them  are  mere  sketches  or  notes 
for  chapters  in  preparation,  which  were  never  di- 
gested or  finished.  Many  are  notes  for  disputa- 
tions in  the  lecture-room.  His  poor  indignation 
against  Herodotus  was  perhaps  a  youthful  prize 
essay  :  it  appeared  to  me  captious  and  labored  ;  or 
perhaps,  at  a  rhetorician's  school,  the  subject  of 
Herodotus  being  the  lesson  of  the  day,  Plutarch 
was  appointed  by  lot  to  take  the  adverse  side. 

The  plain-speaking  of  Plutarch,  as  of  the  ancient 
writers  generally,  coming  from  the  habit  of  writing 
for  one  sex  only,  has  a  great  gain  for  brevity,  and, 
in  our  new  tendencies  of  civilization,  may  tend  to 
correct  a  false  delicacy. 


PLUTARCH.  289 

We  are  always  interested  in  the  man  who  treats 
*he  intellect  well.  We  expect  it  from  the  philoso- 
pher, —  from  Plato,  Aristotle,  Spinoza  and  Kant ; 
but  we  know  that  metaphysical  studies  in  any  but 
minds  of  large  horizon  and  incessant  inspiration 
have  their  dangers.  One  asks  sometimes  whether 
a  metaphysician  can  treat  the  intellect  well.  The 
central  fact  is  the  superhuman  intelligence,  pour- 
ing into  us  from  its  unknown  fountain,  to  be  re- 
ceived with  religious  awe,  and  defended  from  any 
mixture  of  our  will.  But  this  high  Muse  comes 
and  goes  ;  and  the  danger  is  that,  when  the  Muse 
is  wanting,  the  student  is  prone  to  supply  its  place 
with  microscopic  subtleties  and  logomachy.  It  is 
fatal  to  spiritual  health  to  lose  your  admiration. 
"  Let  others  wrangle,"  said  St.  Augustine  ;  "  I 
will  wonder."  Plato  and  Plotinus  are  enthusiasts, 
who  honor  the  race ;  but  the  logic  of  the  sophists 
and  materialists,  whether  Greek  or  French,  fills  us 
with  disgust.  Whilst  we  expect  this  awe  and  rev- 
erence of  the  spiritual  power  from  the  philosopher 
in  his  closet,  we  praise  it  in  the  man  of  the  world ; 
—  the  man  who  lives  on  quiet  terms  with  existing 
institutions,  yet  indicates  his  perception  of  these 
high  oracles ;  as  do  Plutarch,  Montaigne,  Hume 
and  Goethe.  These  men  lift  themselves  at  once 
from  the  vulgar  and  are  not  the  parasites  of  wealth. 
Perhaps  they  sometimes  compromise,  go  out  to  dine, 

VOL.  X.  19 


290  PLUTARCH. 

make  and  take  compliments  ;  but  they  keep  open 
the  source  of  wisdom  and  health.  Plutarch  is  uni- 
formly true  to  this  centre.  He  had  not  lost  his 
wonder.  He  is  a  pronounced  idealist,  who  does  not 
hesitate  to  say,  like  another  Berkeley,  "  Matter  is 
itself  privation; "  and  again,  "  The  Sun  is  the  cause 
that  all  men  are  ignorant  of  Apollo,  by  sense  with- 
drawing  the  rational  intellect  from  that  which  is  to 
that  which  appears."  He  thinks  that  "  souls  are 
naturally  endowed  with  the  faculty  of  prediction ;  " 
he  delights  in  memory,  with  its  miraculous  power 
of  resisting  time.  He  thinks  that  "  Alexander  in- 
vaded Persia  with  greater  assistance  from  Aris- 
totle than  from  his  father  Philip."  He  thinks  that 
"  he  who  has  ideas  of  his  own  is  a  bad  judge  of 
another  man's,  it  being  true  that  the  Eleans  would 
be  the  most  proper  judges  of  the  Olympic  games, 
were  no  Eleans  gamesters."  He  says  of  Socrates, 
that  he  endeavored  to  bring  reason  and  things  to- 
gether, and  make  truth  consist  with  sober  sense. 
He  wonders  with  Plato  at  that  nail  of  pain  and 
pleasure  which  fastens  the  body  to  the  mind.  The 
mathematics  give  him  unspeakable  pleasure,  but  he 
chiefly  liked  that  proportion  which  teaches  us  to 
account  that  which  is  just,  equal;  and  not  that 
which  is  equal,  just. 

Of  philosophy  he  is  more  interested  in  the'  results 
than  in  the  method.     He  has  a  just  instinct  of  the 


PLUTARCH.  291 

presence  of  a  master,  and  prefers  to  sit  as  a  scholar 
with  Plato,  than  as  a  disputant ;  and,  true  to  his 
practical  character,  he  wishes  the  philosopher  not 
to  hide  in  a  corner,  but  to  commend  himself  to  men 
of  public  regards  and  ruling  genius  :  "  for,  if  he 
once  possess  such  a  man  with  principles  of  honor 
and  religion,  he  takes  a  compendious  method,  by- 
doing  good  to  one,  to  oblige  a  great  part  of  man- 
kind." 'T  is  a  temperance,  not  an  eclecticism,  which 
makes  him  adverse  to  the  severe  Stoic,  or  the  Gym- 
nosophist,  or  Diogenes,  or  any  other  extremist. 
That  vice  of  theirs  shall  not  hinder  him  from  citing 
any  good  word  they  chance  to  drop.  He  is  an 
eclectic  in  such  sense  as  Montaigne  was,  —  willing 
to  be  an  expectant,  not  a  dogmatist. 

In  many  of  these  chapters  it  is  easy  to  infer  the 
relation  between  the  Greek  philosophers  and  those 
who  came  to  them  for  instruction.  This  teaching  was 
no  play  nor  routine,  but  strict,  sincere  and  affection- 
ate. The  part  of  each  of  the  class  is  as  important  as 
that  of  the  master.  They  are  like  the  base-ball  play- 
ers, to  whom  the  pitcher,  the  bat,  the  catcher  and  the 
scout  are  equally  important.  And  Plutarch  thought, 
with  Ariston,  "  that  neither  a  bath  nor  a  lecture 
served  any  purpose,  unless  they  were  purgative." 
Plutarch  has  such  a  keen  pleasure  in  realities  that 
he  has  none  in  verbal  disputes ;  he  is  impatient  of 
sophistry,  and  despises  the  Epicharmian  disputa- 


292  PLUTARCH. 

tions :  as,  that  he  who  ran  in  debt  yesterday  owes 
nothing  to-day,  as  being  another  man  ;  so,  he  that 
was  yesterday  invited  to  supper,  the  next  night 
comes  an  unbidden  guest,  for  that  he  is  quite  an- 
other person. 

Except  as  historical  curiosities,  little  can  be  said 
in  behalf  of  the  scientific  value  of  the  "  Opinions  of 
the  Philosophers,"  the  "  Questions  "  and  the  "  Sym- 
posiacs."  They  are,  for  the  most  part,  very  crude 
opinions  ;  many  of  them  so  puerile  that  one  would 
believe  that  Plutarch  in  his  haste  adopted  the  notes 
of  his  younger  auditors,  some  of  them  jocosely  mis- 
reporting  the  dogma  of  the  professor,  who  laid 
them  aside  as  memoranda  for  future  revision,  which 
he  never  gave,  and  they  were  posthumously  pub- 
lished. Now  and  then  there  are  hints  of  superior 
science.  You  may  cull  from  this  record  of  barbarous 
guesses  of  shepherds  and  travellers,  statements  that 
are  predictions  of  facts  established  in  modern  sci- 
ence. Usually,  when  Thales,  Anaximenes  or  An- 
aximander  are  quoted,  it  is  really  a  good  judgment. 
The  explanation  of  the  rainbow,  of  the  floods  of  the 
Nile,  and  of  the  remora,  etc.,  are  just ;  and  the  bad 
guesses  are  not  worse  than  many  of  Lord  Bacon's. 

His  Natural  History  is  that  of  a  lover  and  poet, 
and  not  of  a  physicist.  His  humanity  stooped  af- 
fectionately to  trace  the  virtues  which  he  loved  iu 
the  animals  also.     "  Knowing  and  not  knowing  is 


PLUTARCH.  293 

the  affirmative  or  negative  of  the  dog;  knowing 
you  is  to  be  your  friend ;  not  knowing  you,  your 
enemy."  He  quotes  Thucydides'  saying  that  "  not 
the  desire  of  honor  only  never  grows  old,  but  much 
less  also  the  inclination  to  society  and  affection  to 
the  State,  which  continue  even  in  ants  and  bees  to 
the  very  last." 

But,  though  curious  in  the  questions  of  the 
schools  on  the  nature  and  genesis  of  things,  his  ex- 
treme interest  in  every  trait  of  character,  and  his 
broad  humanity,  lead  him  constantly  to  Morals,  to 
the  study  of  the  Beautiful  and  Good.  Hence  his 
love  of  heroes,  his  rule  of  life,  and  his  clear  convic- 
tions of  the  high  destiny  of  the  soul.  La  Harpe 
said  that  "  Plutarch  is  the  genius  the  most  natu- 
rally moral  that  ever  existed." 

'T  is  almost  inevitable  to  compare  Plutarch  with 
Seneca,  who,  born  fifty  years  earlier,  was  for  many 
years  his  contemporary,  though  they  never  met,  and 
their  writings  were  perhaps  unknown  to  each  other. 
Plutarch  is  genial,  with  an  endless  interest  in  all 
human  and  divine  things  ;  Seneca,  a  professional 
philosopher,  a  writer  of  sentences,  and,  though  he 
keep  a  sublime  path,  is  less  interesting,  because 
less  humane  ;  and  when  we  have  shut  his  book,  we 
forget  to  open  it  again.  There  is  a  certain  violence 
in  his  opinions,  and  want  of  sweetness.  He  lacks 
the  sympathy  of  Plutarch.    He  is  tiresome  through 


294  PLUTARCH. 

perpetual  didactics.  He  is  not  happily  living. 
Cannot  the  simple  lover  of  truth  enjoy  the  virtues 
of  those  he  meets,  and  the  virtues  suggested  by 
them,  so  to  find  himself  at  some  time  purely  con- 
tented ?  Seneca  was  still  more  a  man  of  the  world 
than  Plutarch ;  and,  by  his  conversation  with  the 
Court  of  Nero,  and  his  own  skill,  like  Voltaire's,  of 
living  with  men  of  business  and  emulating  their 
address  in  affairs  by  great  accumulation  of  his  own 
property,  learned  to  temper  his  philosophy  with 
facts.  He  ventured  far,  —  apparently  too  far,  — 
for  so  keen  a  conscience  as  he  inly  had.  Yet  we 
owe  to  that  wonderful  moralist  illustrious  maxims  ; 
as  if  the  scarlet  vices  of  the  times  of  Nero  had  the 
natural  effect  of  driving  virtue  to  its  loftiest  an- 
tagonisms. "  Seneca,"  says  L'Estrange,  "  was  a 
pagan  Christian,  and  is  very  good  reading  for  our 
Christian  pagans."  He  was  Buddhist  in  his  cold 
abstract  virtue,  with  a  certain  impassibility  beyond 
humanity.  He  called  pity,  "  that  fault  of  narrow 
souls."  Yet  what  noble  words  we  owe  to  him : 
"  God  divided  man  into  men,  that  they  might  help 
each  other ; "  and  again,  "  The  good  man  differs 
from  God  in  nothing  but  duration."  His  thoughts 
are  excellent,  if  only  he  had  the  right  to  say  them. 
Plutarch,  meantime,  with  every  virtue  under 
heaven,  thought  it  the  top  of  wisdom  to  philoso- 
phize yet  not  appear  to  do  it,  and  to  reach  in  mirth 


PLUTARCH.  295 

the  same  ends  which  the  most  serious  are  propos- 
ing. 

Plutarch  thought  "  truth  to  be  the  greatest  good 
that  man  can  receive,  and  the  goodliest  blessing 
that  God  can  give."  "  When  you  are  persuaded 
in  your  mind  that  you  cannot  either  offer  or  per- 
form anything  more  agreeable  to  the  gods  than  the 
entertaining  a  right  notion  of  them,  you  will  then 
avoid  superstition  as  a  no  less  evil  than  atheism." 
He  cites  Euripides  to  affirm,  "  If  gods  do  aught 
dishonest,  they  are  no  gods,"  and  the  memorable 
words  of  Antigone,  in  Sophocles,  concerning  the 
moral  sentiment :  — 

"  For  neither  now  nor  yesterday  began 
These  thoughts,  which  have  been  ever,  nor  yet  can 
A  man  be  found  who  their  first  entrance  knew." 

His  faith  in  the  immortality  of  the  soul  is  an- 
other measure  of  his  deep  humanity.  He  reminds 
his  friends  that  the  Delphic  oracles  have  given  sev* 
eral  answers  the  same  in  substance  as  that  formerly 
given  to  Corax  the  Naxian :  — 

"  It  sounds  profane  impiety 
To  teach  that  human  souls  e'er  die." 

He  believes  that  the  doctrine  of  the  Divine  Provi- 
dence, and  that  of  the  immortality  of  the  soul,  rest 
on  one  and  the  same  basis.  He  thinks  it  impossi- 
ble either  that  a  man  beloved  of  the  gods  should 


296  PLUTARCH. 

not  be  happy,  or  that  a  wise  and  just  man  should 
not  be  beloved  of  the  gods.  To  him  the  Epicu- 
reans are  hateful,  who  held  that  the  soul  perishes 
when  it  is  separated  from  the  body.  "  The  soul, 
incapable  of  death,  suffers  in  the  same  manner  in 
the  body,  as  birds  that  are  kept  in  a  cage."  He 
believes  "that  the  souls  of  infants  pass  immedi- 
ately into  a.  better  and  more  divine  state." 

I  can  easily  believe  that  an  anxious  soul  may 
find  in  Plutarch's  chapter  called  "  Pleasure  not  at- 
tainable by  Epicurus,"  and  his  "Letter  to  his  Wife 
Timoxena,"  a  more  sweet  and  reassuring  argument 
on  the  immortality  than  in  the  Phsedo  of  Plato ; 
for  Plutarch  always  addresses  the  question  on  the 
human  side,  and  not  on  the  metaphysical;  as  Wal- 
ter Scott  took  hold  of  boys  and  young  men,  in  Eng- 
land and  America,  and  through  them  of  their  fa- 
thers. His  grand  perceptions  of  duty  lead  him  to 
his  stern  delight  in  heroism ;  a  stoic  resistance  to 
low  indulgence ;  to  a  fight  with  fortune ;  a  regard 
for  truth ;  his  love  of  Sparta,  and  of  heroes  like 
Aristides,  Phocion  and  Cato.  He  insists  that  the 
highest  good  is  in  action.  He  thinks  that  the  in- 
habitants of  Asia  came  to  be  vassals  to  one,  only 
for  not  having  been  able  to  pronounce  one  syllable ; 
which  is,  No.  So  keen  is  his  sense  of  allegiance 
to  right  reason,  that  he  makes  a  fight  against  For- 
tune whenever  she  is  named.     At  Kome  he  thinks 


PLUTARCH.  297 

her  wings  were  clipped :  she  stood  no  longer  on  a 
ball,  but  on  a  cube  as  large  as  Italy.  He  thinks 
it  was  by  superior  virtue  that  Alexander  won  his 
battles  in  Asia  and  Africa,  and  the  Greeks  theirs 
against  Persia. 

But  this  Stoic  in  his  fight  with  Fortune,  with 
vices,  effeminacy  and  indolence,  is  gentle  as  a 
woman  when  other  strings  are  touched.  He  is  the 
most  amiable  of  men.  "  To  erect  a  trophy  in  the 
soul  against  anger  is  that  which  none  but  a  great 
and  victorious  puissance  is  able  to  achieve."  — 
"  Anger  turns  the  mind  out  of  doors,  and  bolts 
the  door."  He  has  a  tenderness  almost  to  tears 
when  he  writes  on  "Friendship,"  on  the  "Train- 
ing of  Children,"  and  on  the  "  Love  of  Brothers." 
"  There  is  no  treasure,"  he  says,  "  parents  can  give 
to  their  children,  like  a  brother;  'tis  a  friend  given 
by  nature,  a  gift  nothing  can  supply ;  once  lost,  not 
to  be  replaced.  The  Arcadian  prophet,  of  whom 
Herodotus  speaks,  was  obliged  to  make  a  wooden 
foot  in  place  of  that  which  had  been  chopped  off. 
A  brother,  embroiled  with  his  brother,  going  to 
seek  in  the  street  a  stranger  who  can  take  his  place, 
resembles  him  who  will  cut  off  his  foot  to  give  him- 
self one  of  wood." 

All  his  judgments  are  noble.  He  thought,  with 
Epicurus,  that  it  is  more  delightful  to  do  than  to 
receive  a  kindness.     "  This  courteous,  gentle,  and 


298  PLUTARCH. 

benign  disposition  and  behavior  is  not  so  accept- 
able, so  obliging  or  delightful  to  any  of  those  with 
whom  we  converse,  as  it  is  to  those  who  have  it." 
There  is  really  no  limit  to  his  bounty :  "  It  would 
be  generous  to  lend  our  eyes  and  ears,  nay,  if  pos- 
sible, our  reason  and  fortitude  to  others,  whilst  we 
are  idle  or  asleep."  His  excessive  and  fanciful 
humanity  reminds  one  of  Charles  Lamb,  whilst  it 
much  exceeds  him.  When  the  guests  are  gone,  he 
"  would  leave  one  lamp  burning,  only  as  a  sign  of 
the  respect  he  bore  to  fires,  for  nothing  so  resem- 
bles an  animal  as  fire.  It  is  moved  and  nourished 
by  itself,  and  by  its  brightness,  like  the  soul,  dis- 
covers and  makes  everything  apparent,  and  in  its 
quenching  shows  some  power  that  seems  to  proceed 
from  a  vital  principle,  for  it  makes  a  noise  and  re- 
sists, like  an  animal  dying,  or  violently  slaugh- 
tered;" and  he  praises  the  Romans,  who,  when  the 
feast  was  over,  "  dealt  well  with  the  lamps,  and  did 
not  take  away  the  nourishment  they  had  given,  but 
permitted  them  to  live  and  shine  by  it." 

I  can  almost  regret  that  the  learned  editor  of  the 
present  republication  has  not  preserved,  if  only  as 
a  piece  of  history,  the  preface  of  Mr.  Morgan,  the 
editor  and  in  part  writer  of  this  Translation  of 
1718.  In  his  dedication  of  the  work  to  the  Arch- 
bishop of  Canterbury,  Wm.  Wake,  he  tells  the 
Primate  that  "  Plutarch  was  the  wisest  man  of  his 


PLUTARCH.  299 

age,  and,  if  he  had  been  a  Christian,  one  of  the 
best  too]  but  it  was  Ms  severe  fate  to  flourish  in 
those  days  of  ignorance,  which,  H  is  a  favorable 
opinion  to  hope  that  the  Almighty  will  sometime 
wink  at ;  that  our  souls  may  he  with  these  philos- 
ophers together  in  the  same  state  of  bliss."  The 
puzzle  in  the  worthy  translator's  mind  between  his 
theology  and  his  reason  well  reappears  in  the  puz- 
zle of  his  sentence. 

I  know  that  the  chapter  of  "  Apothegms  of  Noble 
Commanders  "  is  rejected  by  some  critics  as  not  a 
genuine  work  of  Plutarch ;  but  the  matter  is  good, 
and  is  so  agreeable  to  his  taste  and  genius,  that  if 
he  had  found  it,  he  would  have  adopted  it.  If  he 
did  not  compile  the  piece,  many,  perhaps  most  of 
the  anecdotes  were  already  scattered  in  his  works. 
If  I  do  not  lament  that  a  work  not  his  should  be 
ascribed  to  him,  I  regret  that  he  should  have  suf- 
fered such  destruction  of  his  own.  What  a  trilogy 
is  lost  to  mankind  in  his  Lives  of  Scipio,  Epami- 
nondas,  and  Pindar ! 

His  delight  in  magnanimity  and  self-sacrifice 
has  made  his  books,  like  Homer's  Iliad,  a  bible  for 
heroes ;  and  wherever  the  Cid  is  relished,  the  leg- 
ends of  Arthur,  Saxon  Alfred  and  Richard  the 
Lion-hearted,  Robert  Bruce,  Sydney,  Lord  Herbert 
of  Cherbury,  Cromwell,  Nelson,  Bonaparte,  and 
Walter   Scott's   Chronicles  in  prose  or  verse,  — 


300  PLUTARCH. 

there  will  Plutarch,  who  told  the  story  of  Leonidas, 
of  Agesilaus,  of  Aristides,  Phocion,  Themistocles, 
Demosthenes,  Epaminondas,  Caesar,  Cato  and  the 
rest,  sit  as  the  bestower  of  the  crown  of  noble 
knighthood,  and  laureate  of  the  ancient  world. 

The  chapters  "  On  the  Fortune  of  Alexander,'9 
in  the  "  Morals,"  are  an  important  appendix  to  the 
portrait  in  the  "  Lives."  The  union  in  Alexander 
of  sublime  courage  with  the  refinement  of  his  pure 
tastes,  making  him  the  carrier  of  civilization  into 
the  East,  are  in  the  spirit  of  the  ideal  hero,  and 
endeared  him  to  Plutarch.  That  prince  kept 
Homer's  poems  not  only  for  himself  under  his  pil- 
low in  his  tent,  but  carried  these  for  the  delight  of 
the  Persian  youth,  and  made  them  acquainted  also 
with  the  tragedies  of  Euripides  and  Sophocles. 
He  persuaded  the  Sogdians  not  to  kill,  but  to  cher- 
ish their  aged  parents ;  the  Persians  to  reverence, 
not  marry  their  mothers ;  the  Scythians  to  bury 
and  not  eat  their  dead  parents.  What  a  fruit  and 
fitting  monument  of  his  best  days  was  his  city 
Alexandria,  to  be  the  birthplace  or  home  of  Plo- 
tinus,  St.  Augustine,  Synesius,  Posidonius,  Ammo- 
nius,  Jamblichus,  Porphyry,  Origen,  Aratus,  Apol- 
lonius  and  Apuleius. 

If  Plutarch  delighted  in  heroes,  and  held  the 
balance  between  the  severe  Stoic  and  the  indulgent 
Epicurean,  his  humanity  shines  not  less  in  his  in» 


PLUTARCH.  301 

tercourse  with  his  personal  friends.  He  was  a 
genial  host  and  guest,  and  delighted  in  bringing 
chosen  companions  to  the  supper-table.  He  knew 
the  laws  of  conversation  and  the  laws  of  good-fel- 
lowship quite  as  well  as  Horace,  and  has  set  them 
down  with  such  candor  and  grace  as  to  make  them 
good  reading  to-day.  The  guests  not  invited  to  a 
private  board  by  the  entertainer,  but  introduced  by 
a  guest  as  his  companions,  the  Greek  called  shad- 
ows ;  and  the  question  is  debated  whether  it  was 
civil  to  bring  them,  and  he  treats  it  candidly,  but 
concludes :  "  Therefore,  when  I  make  an  invitation, 
since  it  is  hard  to  break  the  custom  of  the  place, 
I  give  my  guests  leave  to  bring  shadows ;  but  when 
I  myself  am  invited  as  a  shadow,  I  assure  you  I  re- 
fuse to  go."  He  has  an  objection  to  the  introduc- 
tion of  music  at  feasts.  He  thought  it  wonderful 
that  a  man  having  a  muse  in  his  own  breast,  and 
all  the  pleasantness  that  would  fit  an  entertain- 
ment, would  have  pipes  and  harps  play,  and  by 
that  external  noise  destroy  all  the  sweetness  that 
was  proper  and  his  own. 

I  cannot  close  these  notes  without  expressing  my 
sense  of  the  valuable  service  which  the  Editor  has 
rendered  to  his  Author  and  to  his  readers.  Pro- 
fessor Goodwin  is  a  silent  benefactor  to  the  book, 
wherever  I  have  compared  the  editions.  I  did  not 
know  how  careless  and  vicious  in  parts  the  old 


302  PLUTARCH. 

book  was,  until,  in  recent  reading  of  the  old  text, 
on  coming  on  anything  absurd  or  unintelligible,  1 
referred  to  the  new  text  and  found  a  clear  and  ac« 
curate  statement  in  its  place.  It  is  the  vindication 
of  Plutarch.  The  correction  is  not  only  of  names 
of  authors  and  of  places  grossly  altered  or  mis- 
spelled, but  of  unpardonable  liberties  taken  by  the 
translators,  whether  from  negligence  or  freak. 

One  proof  of  Plutarch's  skill  as  a  writer  is  that 
he  bears  translation  so  well.  In  spite  of  its  care- 
lessness and  manifold  faults,  which,  I  doubt  not, 
have  tried  the  patience  of  its  present  learned  editor 
and  corrector,  I  yet  confess  my  enjoyment  of  this 
old  version,  for  its  vigorous  English  style.  The 
work  of  some  forty  or  fifty  University  men,  some  of 
them  imperfect  in  their  Greek,  it  is  a  monument  of 
the  English  language  at  a  period  of  singular  vigor 
and  freedom  of  style.  I  hope  the  Commission  of 
the  Philological  Society  in  London,  charged  with 
the  duty  of  preparing  a  Critical  Dictionary,  will 
not  overlook  these  volumes,  which  show  the  wealth 
of  their  tongue  to  greater  advantage  than  many 
books  of  more  renown  as  models.  It  runs  through 
the  whole  scale  of  conversation  in  the  street,  the 
market,  the  coffee-house,  the  law  courts,  the  palace, 
the  college  and  the  church.  There  are,  no  doubt, 
many  vulgar  phrases,  and  many  blunders  of  the 
printer ;  but  it  is  the  speech  of  business  and  con- 


PLUTARCH.  303 

versation,  and  in  every  tone,  from  lowest  to  high- 
est. 

We  owe  to  these  translators  many  sharp  percep- 
tions of  the  wit  and  humor  of  their  author,  some- 
times even  to  the  adding  of  the  point.  I  notice 
one,  which,  although  the  translator  has  justified 
his  rendering  in  a  note,  the  severer  criticism  of  the 
Editor  has  not  retained.  "  Were  there  not  a  sun, 
we  might,  for  all  the  other  stars,  pass  our  days  in 
the  Reverend  Dark,  as  Heraclitus  calls  it."  I  find 
a  humor  in  the  phrase  which  might  well  excuse  its 
doubtful  accuracy. 

It  is  a  service  to  our  Republic  to  publish  a  book 
that  can  force  ambitious  young  men,  before  they 
mount  the  platform  of  the  county  conventions,  to 
read  the  "Laconic  Apothegms"  and  the  "Apo- 
thegms of  Great  Commanders."  If  we  could  keep 
"the  secret,  and  communicate  it  only  to  a  few  chosen 
aspirants,  we  might  confide  that,  by  this  noble  in- 
filtration, they  would  easily  carry  the  victory  over 
all  competitors.  But,  as  it  was  the  desire  of  these 
old  patriots  to  fill  with  their  majestic  spirit  all 
Sparta  or  Rome,  and  not  a  few  leaders  only,  we 
hasten  to  offer  them  to  the  American  people. 

Plutarch's  popularity  will  return  in  rapid  cycles. 
If  over-read  in  this  decade,  so  that  his  anecdotes 
and  opinions  become  commonplace,  and  to-day's 


304  PLUTARCH. 

novelties  are  sought  for  variety,  his  sterling  values 
will  presently  recall  the  eye  and  thought  of  the  best 
minds,  and  his  books  will  be  reprinted  and  read 
anew  by  coming  generations.  And  thus  Plutarch 
will  be  perpetually  rediscovered  from  time  to  time 
as  long  as  books  last. 


HISTORIC  NOTES  OF  LIFE  AND  LETTERS 
IN  NEW  ENGLAND. 


"  Of  old  things  all  are  over  old, 

Of  good  things  none  are  good  enough ;  — 
We  '11  show  that  we  can  help  to  frame 
A  world  of  other  stuff." 


For  Joy  and  Beauty  planted  it 
With  faerie  gardens  cheered, 

And  boding  Fancy  haunted  it 
With  men  and  women  weirdo 


HISTORIC   NOTES    OF   LIFE  AND    LET- 
TERS IN  NEW  ENGLAND. 


The  ancient  manners  were  giving  way.  There 
grew  a  certain  tenderness  on  the  people,  not  before 
remarked.  Children  had  been  repressed  and  kept 
in  the  background ;  now  they  were  considered,  cos- 
seted and  pampered.  I  recall  the  remark  of  a  witty 
physician  who  remembered  the  hardships  of  his  own 
youth;  he  said,  "It  was  a  misfortune  to  have  been 
born  when  children  were  nothing,  and  to  live  till 
men  were  nothing." 

There  are  always  two  parties,  the  party  of  the 
Past  and  the  party  of  the  Future ;  the  Establish- 
ment and  the  Movement.  At  times  the  resistance 
is  reanimated,  the  schism  runs  under  the  world  and 
appears  in  Literature,  Philosophy,  Church,  State, 
and  social  customs.  It  is  not  easy  to  date  these 
eras  of  activity  with  any  precision,  but  in  this  re- 
gion one  made  itself  remarked,  say  in  1820  and  the 
twenty  years  following. 

It  seemed  a  war  between  intellect  and  affection ; 
a  crack  in  nature,  which  split  every  church  in  Chris- 


308  HISTORIC  NOTES  OF 

tendom  into  Papal  and  Protestant ;  Calvinism  into 
Old  and  New  schools;  Quakerism  into  Old  and 
New ;  brought  new  divisions  in  polities ;  as  the  new 
conscience  touching  temperance  and  slavery.  The 
key  to  the  period  appeared  to  be  that  the  mind  had 
become  aware  of  itself.  Men  grew  reflective  and 
intellectual.  There  was  a  new  consciousness.  The 
former  generations  acted  under  the  belief  that  a 
shining  social  prosperity  was  the  beatitude  of  man, 
and  sacrificed  uniformly  the  citizen  to  the  State. 
The  modern  mind  believed  that  the  nation  existed 
for  the  individual,  for  the  guardianship  and  educa- 
tion of  every  man.  This  idea,  roughly  written  in 
revolutions  and  national  movements,  in  the  mind  of 
the  philosopher  had  far  more  precision ;  the  individ- 
ual is  the  world. 

This  perception  is  a  sword  such  as  was  never 
drawn  before.  It  divides  and  detaches  bone  and 
marrow,  soul  and  body,  yea,  almost  the  man  from 
himself.  It  is  the  age  of  severance,  of  dissociation, 
of  freedom,  of  analysis,  of  detachment.  Every  man 
for  himself.  The  public  speaker  disclaims  speak- 
ing for  any  other ;  he  answers  only  for  himself. 
The  social  sentiments  are  weak ;  the  sentiment  of 
patriotism  is  weak  ;  veneration  is  low  ;  the  natural 
affections  feebler  than  they  were.  People  grow 
philosophical  about  native  land  and  parents  and 
relations.     There  is  an  universal  resistance  to  ties 


LIFE  AND  LETTERS  IN  NEW  ENGLAND.     309 

and  ligaments  once  supposed  essential  to  civil  soci- 
ety. The  new  race  is  stiff,  heady  and  rebellious ; 
they  are  fanatics  in  freedom ;  they  hate  tolls,  taxes, 
turnpikes,  banks,  hierarchies,  governors,  yea,  almost 
laws.  They  have  a  neck  of  unspeakable  tenderness ; 
it  winces  at  a  hair.  They  rebel  against  theological 
as  against  political  dogmas ;  against  mediation,  or 
saints,  or  any  nobility  in  the  unseen. 

The  age  tends  to  solitude.  The  association  of  the 
time  is  accidental  and  momentary  and  hypocritical, 
the  detachment  intrinsic  and  progressive.  The  as- 
sociation is  for  power,  merely,  —  for  means  ;  the  end 
being  the  enlargement  and  independency  of  the  in- 
dividual. Anciently,  society  was  in  the  course  of 
things.  There  was  a  Sacred  Band,  a  Theban  Pha- 
lanx. There  can  be  none  now.  College  classes, 
military  corps,  or  trades-unions  may  fancy  them- 
selves indissoluble  for  a  moment,  over  their  wine  ; 
but  it  is  a  painted  hoop,  and  has  no  girth.  The  age 
of  arithmetic  and  of  criticism  has  set  in.  The  struc- 
tures of  old  faith  in  every  department  of  society  a 
few  centuries  have  sufficed  to  destroy.  Astrology, 
magic,  palmistry,  are  long  gone.  The  very  last 
ghost  is  laid.  Demonology  is  on  its  last  legs.  Pre- 
rogative, government,  goes  to  pieces  day  by  day. 
Europe  is  strewn  with  wrecks  ;  a  constitution  once 
a  week.  In  social  manners  and  morals  the  revolu- 
tion is  just  as  evident.     In  the  la,w  courts,  crimes 


310  HISTORIC  NOTES  OF 

of  fraud  have  taken  the  place  of  crimes  of  force. 
The  stockholder  has  stepped  into  the  place  of  the 
warlike  baron.  The  nobles  shall  not  any  longer, 
as  feudal  lords,  have  power  of  life  and  death  over 
the  churls,  but  now,  in  another  shape,  as  capitalists, 
shall  in  all  love  and  peace  eat  them  up  as  before. 
Nay,  government  itself  becomes  the  resort  of  those 
whom  government  was  invented  to  restrain.  "  Are 
there  any  brigands  on  the  road?  "  inquired  the  trav- 
eller in  France.  "  Oh,  no,  set  your  heart  at  rest  on 
that  point,"  said  the  landlord ;  "  what  should  these 
fellows  keep  the  highway  for,  when  they  can  rob 
just  as  effectually,  and  much  more  at  their  ease,  in 
the  bureaus  of  office  ?  " 

In  literature  the  effect  appeared  in  the  decided 
tendency  of  criticism.  The  most  remarkable  lit- 
erary work  of  the  age  has  for  its  hero  and  subject 
precisely  this  introversion:  I  mean  the  poem  of 
Faust.  In  philosophy,  Immanuel  Kant  has  made 
the  best  catalogue  of  the  human  faculties  and  the 
best  analysis  of  the  mind.  Hegel  also,  especially. 
In  science  the  French  savant,  exact,  pitiless,  with 
barometer,  crucible,  chemic  test  and  calculus  in 
hand,  travels  into  all  nooks  and  islands,  to  weigh, 
to  analyze  and  report.  And  chemistry,  which  is 
the  analysis  of  matter,  has  taught  us  that  we  eat 
gas,  drink  gas,  tread  on  gas,  and  are  gas.  The 
same  decomposition  has  changed  the  whole  face  of 


LIFE  AND  LETTERS  IN  NEW  ENGLAND.     811 

physics ;  the  like  in  all  arts,  modes.  Authority 
falls,  in  Church,  College,  Courts  of  Law,  Faculties, 
Medicine.  Experiment  is  credible;  antiquity  is 
grown  ridiculous. 

It  marked  itself  by  a  certain  predominance  of 
the  intellect  in  the  balance  of  powers.  The  warm 
swart  Earth-spirit  which  made  the  strength  of 
past  ages,  mightier  than  it  knew,  with  instincts  in- 
stead of  science,  like  a  mother  yielding  food  from 
her  own  breast  instead  of  preparing  it  through 
chemic  and  culinary  skill,  —  warm  negro  ages  of 
sentiment  and  vegetation,  —  all  gone  ;  another  hour 
had  struck  and  other  forms  arose.  Instead  of  the 
social  existence  which  all  shared,  was  now  separa- 
tion. Every  one  for  himself ;  driven  to  find  all  his 
resources,  hopes,  rewards,  society  and  deity  within 
himself. 

The  young  men  were  born  with  knives  in  their 
brain,  a  tendency  to  introversion,  self-dissection, 
anatomizing  of  motives.  The  popular  religion  of 
our  fathers  had  received  many  severe  shocks  from 
the  new  times ;  from  the  Arminians,  which  was  the 
current  name  of  the  backsliders  from  Calvinism, 
sixty  years  ago  ;  then  from  the  English  philosophic 
theologians,  Hartley  and  Priestley  and  Belsham, 
the  followers  of  Locke ;  and  then  I  should  say 
much  later  from  the  slow  but  extraordinary  influence 
of  Swedenborg  ;  a  man  of  prodigious  mind,  though 


312  HISTORIC  NOTES  OF 

as  I  think  tainted  with  a  certain  suspicion  of  insan- 
ity, and  therefore  generally  disowned,  but  exerting 
a  singular  power  over  an  important  intellectual 
class ;  then  the  powerful  influence  of  the  genius  and 
character  of  Dr.  Channing. 

Germany  had  created  criticism  in  vain  for  us  un- 
til 1820,  when  Edward  Everett  returned  from  his 
five  years  in  Europe,  and  brought  to  Cambridge 
his  rich  results,  which  no  one  was  so  fitted  by  nat- 
ural grace  and  the  splendor  of  his  rhetoric  to  intro- 
duce and  recommend.  He  made  us  for  the  first 
time  acquainted  with  Wolff's  theory  of  the  Homeric 
writings,  with  the  criticism  of  Heyne.  The  nov- 
elty of  the  learning  lost  nothing  in  the  skill  and 
genius  of  his  relation,  and  the  rudest  undergraduate 
found  a  new  morning  opened  to  him  in  the  lecture- 
room  of  Harvard  Hall. 

There  was  an  influence  on  the  young  people  from 
the  genius  of  Everett  which  was  almost  comparable 
to  that  of  Pericles  in  Athens.  He  had  an  inspira- 
tion which  did  not  go  beyond  his  head,  but  which 
made  him  the  master  of  elegance.  If  any  of  my 
readers  were  at  that  period  in  Boston  or  Cambridge, 
they  will  easily  remember  his  radiant  beauty  of 
person,  of  a  classic  style,  his  heavy  large  eye,  mar- 
ble lids,  which  gave  the  impression  of  mass  which 
the  slightness  of  his  form  needed  ;  sculptured  lips ; 
a  voice  of  such  rich  tones,  such  precise  and  perfect 


LIFE  AND  LETTERS  IN  NEW  ENGLAND.   313 

utterance,  that,  although  slightly  nasal,  it  was  the 
most  mellow  and  beautiful  and  correct  of  all  the 
instruments  of  the  time.  The  word  that  he  spoke, 
in  the  manner  in  which  he  spoke  it,  became  current 
and  classical  in  New  England.  He  had  a  great 
talent  for  collecting  facts,  and  for  bringing  those 
he  had  to  bear  with  ingenious  felicity  on  the  topic 
of  the  moment.  Let  him  rise  to  speak  on  what  oc- 
casion soever,  a  fact  had  always  just  transpired 
which  composed,  with  some  other  fact  well  known 
to  the  audience,  the  most  pregnant  and  happy  coin- 
cidence. It  was  remarked  that  for  a  man  who 
threw  out  so  many  facts  he  was  seldom  convicted 
of  a  blunder.  He  had  a  good  deal  of  special  learn- 
ing, and  all  his  learning  was  available  for  purposes 
of  the  hour.  It  was  all  new  learning,  that  wonder- 
fully took  and  stimulated  the  young  men.  It  was 
so  coldly  and  weightily  communicated  from  so  com- 
manding a  platform,  as  if  in  the  consciousness  and 
consideration  of  all  history  and  all  learning, — 
adorned  with  so  many  simple  and  austere  beauties 
of  expression,  and  enriched  with  so  many  excellent 
digressions  and  significant  quotations,  that,  though 
nothing  could  be  conceived  beforehand  less  attrac- 
tive or  indeed  less  fit  for  green  boys  from  Connec- 
ticut, New  Hampshire  and  Massachusetts,  with 
their  unripe  Latin  and  Greek  reading,  than  exeget- 
ical  discourses  in  the  style  of  Voss  and  Wolff  and 


314  HISTORIC  NOTES  OF 

Ruhnken,  on  the  Orphic  and  Ante-Homeric  re- 
mains,—  yet  this  learning  instantly  took  the  high- 
est place  to  our  imagination  in  our  unoccupied 
American  Parnassus.  All  his  auditors  felt  the  ex- 
treme beauty'  and  dignity  of  the  manner,  and  even 
the  coarsest  were  contented  to  go  punctually  to  lis- 
ten, for  the  manner,  when  they  had  found  out  that 
the  subject-matter  was  not  for  them.  In  the  lec- 
ture-rooin,  he  abstained  from  all  ornament,  and 
pleased  himself  with  the  play  of  detailing  erudition 
in  a  style  of  perfect  simplicity.  In  the  pulpit  (for 
he  was  then  a  clergyman)  he  made  amends  to  him- 
self and  his  auditor  for  the  self-denial  of  the  pro- 
fessor's chair,  and,  with  an  infantine  simplicity  still, 
of  manner,  he  gave  the  reins  to  his  florid,  quaint 
and  affluent  fancy. 

Then  was  exhibited  all  the  richness  of  a  rhetoric 
which  we  have  never  seen  rivalled  in  this  country. 
Wonderful  how  memorable  were  words  made  which 
were  only  pleasing  pictures,  and  covered  no  new  or 
valid  thoughts.  He  abounded  in  sentences,  in  wit, 
in  satire,  in  splendid  allusion,  in  quotation  impossi- 
ble to  forget,  in  daring  imagery,  in  parable  and 
even  in  a  sort  of  defying  experiment  of  his  own 
wit  and  skill  in  giving  an  oracular  weight  to  He- 
brew or  Eabbinical  words  ;  —  feats  which  no  man 
could  better  accomplish,  such  was  his  self-command 
and  the  security  of  his  manner.     All  his  speech 


LIFE  AND  LETTERS  IN  NEW  ENGLAND.     315 

was  music,  and  with  such  variety  and  invention 
that  the  ear  was  never  tired.  Especially  beautiful 
were  his  poetic  quotations.  He  delighted  in  quot- 
ing: Milton,  and  with  such  sweet  modulation  that 
he  seemed  to  give  as  much  beauty  as  he  borrowed ; 
and  whatever  he  has  quoted  will  be  remembered  by 
any  who  heard  him,  with  inseparable  association 
with  his  voice  and  genius.  He  had  nothing  in  com- 
mon with  vulgarity  and  infirmity,  but,  speaking, 
walking,  sitting,  was  as  much  aloof  and  uncommon 
as  a  star.  The  smallest  anecdote  of  his  behavior 
or  conversation  was  eagerly  caught  and  repeated, 
and  every  young  scholar  could  recite  brilliant  sen- 
tences from  his  sermons,  with  mimicry,  good  or  bad, 
of  his  voice.  This  influence  went  much  farther, 
for  he  who  was  heard  with  such  throbbing  hearts 
and  sparkling  eyes  in  the  lighted  and  crowded 
churches,  did  not  let  go  his  hearers  when  the  church 
was  dismissed,  but  the  bright  image  of  that  elo- 
quent form  followed  the  boy  home  to  his  bed-cham- 
ber ;  and  not  a  sentence  was  written  in  academic 
exercises,  not  a  declamation  attempted  in  the  col- 
lege chapel,  but  showed  the  omnipresence  of  his 
genius  to  youthful  heads.  This  made  every  youth 
his  defender,  and  boys  filled  their  mouths  with  ar- 
guments to  prove  that  the  orator  had  a  heart.  This 
was  a  triumph  of  Rhetoric.  It  was  not  the  intel- 
lectual or  the  moral  principles  which  he  had  to 


316  HISTORIC  NOTES  OF 

teach.  It  was  not  thoughts.  When  Massachusetts 
was  full  of  his  fame  it  was  not  contended  that  he 
had  thrown  any  truths  into  circulation.  But  his 
power  lay  in  the  magic  of  form;  it  was  in  the 
graces  of  manner ;  in  a  new  perception  of  Grecian 
beauty,  to  which  he  had  opened  our  eyes.  There 
was  that  finish  about  this  person  which  is  about 
women,  and  which  distinguishes  every  piece  of  gen- 
ius from  the  works  of  talent,  —  that  these  last  are 
more  or  less  matured  in  every  degree  of  complete- 
ness according  to  the  time  bestowed  on  them,  but 
works  of  genius  in  their  first  and  slightest  form  are 
still  wholes.  In  every  public  discourse  there  was 
nothing  left  for  the  indulgence  of  his  hearer,  no 
marks  of  late  hours  and  anxious,  unfinished  study, 
but  the  goddess  of  grace  had  breathed  on  the  work 
a  last  fragrancy  and  glitter. 

By  a  series  of  lectures  largely  and  fashionably 
attended  for  two  winters  in  Boston  he  made  a  be- 
ginning of  popular  literary  and  miscellaneous  lec- 
turing, which  in  that  region  at  least  had  important 
results.  It  is  acquiring  greater  importance  every 
day,  and  becoming  a  national  institution.  I  am 
quite  certain  that  this  purely  literary  influence  was 
of  the  first  importance  to  the  American  mind. 

In  the  pulpit  Dr.  Frothingham,  an  excellent 
classical  and  German  scholar,  had  already  made  us 
acquainted,  if  prudently,  with  the  genius  of  Eicb 


LIFE  AND  LETTERS  IN  NEW  ENGLAND.     317 

horn's  theologic  criticism.  And  Professor  Norton 
a  little  later  gave  form  and  method  to  the  like 
studies  in  the  then  infant  Divinity  School.  But  I 
think  the  paramount  source  of  the  religious  revolu- 
tion was  Modern  Science  ;  beginning  with  Coperni- 
cus, who  destroyed  the  pagan  fictions  of  the 
Church,  by  showing  mankind  that  the  earth  on 
which  we  live  was  not  the  centre  of  the  Universe, 
around  which  the  sun  and  stars  revolved  every  day, 
and  thus  fitted  to  be  the  platform  on  which  the 
Drama  of  the  Divine  Judgment  was  played  before 
the  assembled  Angels  of  Heaven,  —  "  the  scaffold 
of  the  divine  vengeance"  Saurin  called  it,  —  but 
a  little  scrap  of  a  planet,  rushing  round  the  sun  in 
our  system,  which  in  turn  was  too  minute  to  be 
seen  at  the  distance  of  many  stars  which  we  be- 
hold. Astronomy  taught  us  our  insignificance  in 
Nature;  showed  that  our  sacred  as  our  profane 
history  had  been  written  in  gross  ignorance  of  the 
laws,  which  were  far  grander  than  we  knew ;  and 
compelled  a  certain  extension  and  uplifting  of  our 
views  of  the  Deity  and  his  Providence.  This  cor- 
rection of  our  superstitions  was  confirmed  by  the 
new  science  of  Geology,  and  the  whole  train  of  dis- 
coveries in  every  department.  But  we  presently 
saw  also  that  the  religious  nature  in  man  was  not 
affected  by  these  errors  in  his  understanding.  The 
religious  sentiment  made  nothing  of  bulk  or  size, 


318  HISTORIC  NOTES  OF 

or  far  or  near  ;  triumphed  over  time  as  well  as 
space  ;  and  every  lesson  of  humility,  or  justice,  or 
charity,  which  the  old  ignorant  saints  had  taught 
him,  was  still  forever  true. 

Whether  from  these  influences,  or  whether  by  a 
reaction  of  the  general  mind  against  the  too  formal 
science,  religion  and  social  life  of  the  earlier  period, 
■ —  there  was,  in  the  first  quarter  of  our  nineteenth 
century,  a  certain  sharpness  of  criticism,  an  eager- 
ness for  reform,  which  showed  itself  in  every  quar- 
ter. It  appeared  in  the  popularity  of  Lavater's 
Physiognomy,  now  almost  forgotten.  Gall  and 
Spurzheim's  Phrenology  laid  a  rough  hand  on  the 
mysteries  of  animal  and  spiritual  nature,  dragging 
down  every  sacred  secret  to  a  street  show.  The 
attempt  was  coarse  and  odious  to  scientific  men, 
but  had  a  certain  truth  in  it  ;  it  felt  connection 
where  the  professors  denied  it,  and  was  a  leading 
to  a  truth  which  had  not  yet  been  announced.  On 
the  heels  of  this  intruder  came  Mesmerism,  which 
broke  into  the  inmost  shrines,  attempted  the  expla- 
nation of  miracle  and  prophecy,  as  well  as  of  crea- 
tion. What  could  be  more  revolting  to  the  contem- 
plative philosopher  !  But  a  certain  success  at- 
tended it,  against  all  expectation.  It  was  human, 
it  was  genial,  it  affirmed  unity  and  connection  be- 
tween remote  points,  and  as  such  was  excellent 
criticism  on  the  narrow  and  dead  classification  of 


LIFE  AND  LETTERS  IN  NEW  ENGLAND.     319 

what  passed  for  science  ;  and  the  joy  with  which  it 
was  greeted  was  an  instinct  of  the  people  which  no 
true  philosopher  would  fail  to  profit  by.  But  while 
society  remained  in  doubt  between  the  indignation 
of  the  old  school  and  the  audacity  of  the  new,  a 
higher  note  sounded.  Unexpected  aid  from  high 
quarters  came  to  iconoclasts.  The  German  poet 
Goethe  revolted  against  the  science  of  the  day, 
against  French  and  English  science,  declared  war 
against  the  great  name  of  Newton,  proposed  his 
own  new  and  simple  optics  :  in  Botany,  his  sim- 
ple theory  of  metamorphosis  ;  —  the  eye  of  a  leaf 
is  all ;  every  part  of  the  plant  from  root  to  fruit  is 
only  a  modified  leaf,  the  branch  of  a  tree  is  noth- 
ing but  a  leaf  whose  serratures  have  become  twigs. 
He  extended  this  into  anatomy  and  animal  life,  and 
his  views  were  accepted.  The  revolt  became  a  rev- 
olution. Schelling  and  Oken  introduced  their 
ideal  natural  philosophy,  Hegel  his  metaphysics, 
and  extended  it  to  Civil  History. 

The  result  in  literature  and  the  general  mind 
was  a  return  to  law ;  in  science,  in  politics,  in  so- 
cial life ;  as  distinguished  from  the  profligate  man- 
ners and  politics  of  earlier  times.  The  age  was 
moral.  Every  immorality  is  a  departure  from  na- 
ture, and  is  punished  by  natural  loss  and  defor- 
mity. The  popularity  of  Combe's  Constitution  of 
Man ;  the  humanity  which  was  the  aim  of  all  the 


320  HISTORIC  NOTES  OF 

multitudinous  works  of  Dickens  ;  the  tendency 
even  of  Punch's  caricature,  was  all  on  the  side  of 
the  people.  There  was  a  breath  of  new  air,  much 
vague  expectation,  a  consciousness  of  power  not  yet 
finding  its  determinate  aim. 

I  attribute  much  importance  to  two  papers  of 
Dr.  Channing,  one  on  Milton  and  one  on  Napoleon, 
which  were  the  first  specimens  in  this  country  of 
that  large  criticism  which  in  England  had  given 
power  and  fame  to  the  Edinburgh  Review.  They 
were  widely  read,  and  of  course  immediately  fruit- 
ful in  provoking  emulation  which  lifted  the  style  of 
Journalism.  Dr.  Channing,  whilst  he  lived,  was 
the  star  of  the  American  Church,  and  we  then 
thought,  if  we  do  not  still  think,  that  he  left  no 
successor  in  the  pulpit.  He  could  never  be  re- 
ported, for  his  eye  and  voice  could  not  be  printed, 
and  his  discourses  lose  their  best  in  losing  them. 
.He  was  made  for  the  public;  his  cold  temperament 
made  him  the  most  unprofitable  private  companion ; 
but  all  America  would  have  been  impoverished  in 
wanting  him.  We  could  not  then  spare  a  single 
word  he  uttered  in  public,  not  so  much  as  the  read- 
ing a  lesson  in  Scripture,  or  a  hymn,  and  it  is  cu- 
rious that  his  printed  writings  are  almost  a  history 
of  the  times ;  as  there  was  no  great  public  interest, 
political,  literary,  or  even  economical  (for  he  wrote 
on  the  Tariff),   on  which  he  did  not  leave  some 


LIFE  AND  LETTERS  IN  NEW  ENGLAND.     321 

printed  record  of  his  brave  and  thoughtful  opinion. 
A  poor  little  invalid  all  his  life,  he  is  yet  one  of 
those  men  who  vindicate  the  power  of  the  American 
race  to  produce  greatness. 

Dr.  Channing  took  counsel  in  1840  with  George 
Ripley,  to  the  point  whether  it  were  possible  to 
bring  cultivated,  thoughtful  people  together,  and 
make  society  that  deserved  the  name.  He  had 
earlier  talked  with  Dr.  John  Collins  Warren  on 
the  like  purpose,  who  admitted  the  wisdom  of  the 
design  and  undertook  to  aid  him  in  making  the 
experiment.  Dr.  Channing  repaired  to  Dr.  War- 
ren's house  on  the  appointed  evening,  with  large 
thoughts  which  he  wished  to  open.  He  found  a 
well-chosen  assembly  of  gentlemen  variously  distin- 
guished ;  there  was  mutual  greeting  and  introduc- 
tion, and  they  were  chatting  agreeably  on  indiffer- 
ent matters  and  drawing  gently  towards  their  great 
expectation,  when  a  side-door  opened,  the  whole 
company  streamed  in  to  an  oyster  supper,  crowned 
by  excellent  wines  ;  and  so  ended  the  first  attempt 
to  establish  aesthetic  society  in  Boston. 

Some  time  afterwards  Dr.  Channing  opened  his 
mind  to  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Ripley,  and  with  some  care 
they  invited  a  limited  party  of  ladies  and  gentle- 
men. I  had  the  honor  to  be  present.  Though  I 
recall  the  fact,  I  do  not  retain  any  instant  conse- 
quence of  this  attempt,  or  any  connection  between 

VOL.  x.  si 


322  HISTORIC  NOTES  OF 

it  and  the  new  zeal  of  the  friends  who  at  that  time 
began  to  be  drawn  together  by  sympathy  of  studies 
and  of  aspiration.  Margaret  Fuller,  George  Rip- 
ley, Dr.  Convers  Francis,  Theodore  Parker,  Dr. 
Hedge,  Mr.  Brownson,  James  Freeman  Clarke, 
William  H.  Channing,  and  many  others,  gradually 
drew  together  and  from  time  to  time  spent  an  af- 
ternoon at  each  other's  houses  in  a  serious  conver- 
sation. With  them  was  always  one  well-known 
form,  a  pure  idealist,  not  at  all  a  man  of  letters, 
nor  of  any  practical  talent,  nor  a  writer  of  books  ; 
a  man  quite  too  cold  and  contemplative  for  the  al- 
liances of  friendship,  with  rare  simplicity  and 
grandeur  of  perception,  who  read  Plato  as  an  equal, 
and  inspired  his  companions  only  in  proportion  as 
they  were  intellectual,  —  whilst  the  men  of  talent 
complained  of  the  want  of  point  and  precision  in 
this  abstract  and  religious  thinker. 

These  fine  conversations,  of  course,  were  incom- 
prehensible to  some  in  the  company,  and  they  had 
their  revenge  in  their  little  joke.  One  declared 
that  "  It  seemed  to  him  like  going  to  heaven  in  a 
swing ; "  another  reported  that,  at  a  knotty  point 
in  the  discourse,  a  sympathizing  Englishman  with 
a  squeaking  voice  interrupted  with  the  question, 
"Mr.  Alcott,  a  lady  near  me  desires  to  inquire 
whether  omnipotence  abnegates  attribute  ?  " 

I  think  there  prevailed  at  that  time  a  general  be- 


LIFE  AND  LETTERS  IN  NEW  ENGLAND.     323 

lief  in  Boston  that  there  was  some  concert  of  doc- 
trinaires to  establish  certain  opinions  and  inaugu- 
rate some  movement  in  literature,  philosophy,  and 
religion,  of  which  design  the  supposed  conspirators 
were  quite  innocent ;  for  there  was  no  concert,  and 
only  here  and  there  two  or  three  men  or  women 
who  read  and  wrote,  each  alone,  with  unusual  vi- 
vacity. Perhaps  they  only  agreed  in  having  fallen 
upon  Coleridge  and  Wordsworth  and  Goethe,  then 
on  Carlyle,  with  pleasure  and  sympathy.  Other- 
wise, their  education  and  reading  were  not  marked, 
but  had  the  American  superficialness,  and  their 
studies  were  solitary.  I  suppose  all  of  them  were 
surprised  at  this  rumor  of  a  school  or  sect,  and  cer- 
tainly at  the  name  of  Transcendentalism,  given  no- 
body knows  by  whom,  or  when  it  was  first  applied. 
As  these  persons  became  in  the  common  chances  of 
society  acquainted  with  each  other,  there  resulted 
certainly  strong  friendships,  which  of  course  were 
exclusive  in  proportion  to  their  heat :  and  perhaps 
those  persons  who  were  mutually  the  best  friends 
were  the  most  private  and  had  no  ambition  of  pub- 
lishing their  letters,  diaries,  or  conversation. 

From  that  time  meetings  were  held  for  conversa- 
tion, with  very  little  form,  from  house  to  house,  of 
people  engaged  in  studies,  fond  of  books,  and  watch- 
ful of  all  the  intellectual  light  from  whatever  quar- 
ter it  flowed.    Nothing  could  be  less  formal,  yet  the 


324  HISTORIC  NOTES  OF 

intelligence  and  character  and  varied  ability  of  the 
company  gave  it  some  notoriety  and  perhaps  waked 
curiosity  as  to  its  aims  and  results. 

Nothing  more  serious  came  of  it  than  the  modest 
quarterly  journal  called  "  The  Dial  "  which,  under 
the  editorship  of  Margaret  Fuller,  and  later  of  some 
other,  enjoyed  its  obscurity  for  four  years.  All  its 
papers  were  unpaid  contributions,  and  it  was  rather 
a  work  of  friendship  among  the  narrow  circle  of 
students  than  the  organ  of  any  party.  Perhaps  its 
writers  were  its  chief  readers:  yet  it  contained 
some  noble  papers  by  Margaret  Fuller,  and  some 
numbers  had  an  instant  exhausting  sale,  because 
of  papers  by  Theodore  Parker. 

Theodore  Parker  was  our  Savonarola,  an  excel- 
lent scholar,  in  frank  and  affectionate  communica- 
tion with  the  best  minds  of  his  day,  yet  the  tribune 
of  the  people,  and  the  stout  Reformer  to  urge  and 
defend  every  cause  of  humanity  with  and  for  the 
humblest  of  mankind.  He  was  no  artist.  Highly 
refined  persons  might  easily  miss  in  him  the  ele- 
ment of  beauty.  What  he  said  was  mere  fact,  al- 
most offended  you,  so  bald  and  detached ;  little 
cared  he.  He  stood  altogether  for  practical  truth ; 
and  so  to  the  last.  He  used  every  day  and  hour  of 
his  short  life,  and  his  character  appeared  in  the  last 
moments  with  the  same  firm  control  as  in  the  mid. 
day  of  strength.     I  habitually  apply  to  him  the 


LIFE  AND  LETTERS  IN  NEW  ENGLAND.     325 

words  of  a  French  philosopher  who  speaks  of  "  the 
man  of  Nature  who  abominates  the  steam-engine 
and  the  factory.  His  vast  lungs  breathe  independ- 
ence with  the  air  of  the  mountains  and  the  woods." 
The  vulgar  politician  disposed  of  this  circle 
cheaply  as  "  the  sentimental  class."  State  Street 
had  an  instinct  that  they  invalidated  contracts  and 
threatened  the  stability  of  stocks ;  and  it  did  not 
fancy  brusque  manners.  Society  always  values, 
even  in  its  teachers,  inoffensive  people,  susceptible 
of  conventional  polish.  The  clergyman  who  would 
live  in  the  city  may  have  piety,  but  must  have  taste, 
whilst  there  was  often  coming,  among  these,  some 
John  the  Baptist,  wild  from  the  woods,  rude,  hairy, 
careless  of  dress  and  quite  scornful  of  the  etiquette 
of  cities.  There  was  a  pilgrim  in  those  days  walking 
in  the  country  who  stopped  at  every  door  where  he 
hoped  to  find  hearing  for  his  doctrine,  which  was, 
Never  to  give  or  receive  money.  He  was  a  poor 
printer,  and  explained  with  simple  warmth  the  be- 
lief of  himself  and  five  or  six  young  men  with 
whom  he  agreed  in  opinion,  of  the  vast  mischief  of 
our  insidious  coin.  He  thought  every  one  should 
labor  at  some  necessary  product,  and  as  soon  as  he 
had  made  more  than  enough  for  himself,  were  it 
corn,  or  paper,  or  cloth,  or  boot-jacks,  he  should 
give  of  the  commodity  to  any  applicant,  and  in  turn 
go  to  his  neighbor  for  any  article  which  he  had  to 


326  HISTORIC  NOTES  OF 

spare.  Of  course  we  were  curious  to  know  how  lie 
sped  in  his  experiments  on  the  neighbor,  and  his 
anecdotes  were  interesting,  and  often  highly  credit- 
able. But  he  had  the  courage  which  so  stern  a  re- 
turn to  Arcadian  manners  required,  and  had  learned 
to  sleep,  in  cold  nights,  when  the  farmer  at  whose 
door  he  knocked  declined  to  give  him  a  bed,  on  a 
wagon  covered  with  the  buffalo-robe  under  the  shed, 
—  or  under  the  stars,  when  the  farmer  denied 
the  shed  and  the  buffalo-robe.  I  think  he  persisted 
for  two  years  in  his  brave  practice,  but  did  not  en- 
large his  church  of  believers. 

These  reformers  were  a  new  class,  instead  of 
the  fiery  souls  of  the  Puritans,  bent  on  hanging  the 
Quaker,  burning  the  witch  and  banishing  the  Ro- 
manist, these  were  gentle  souls,  with  peaceful  and 
even  with  genial  dispositions,  casting  sheep's-eyes 
even  on  Fourier  and  his  houris.  It  was  a  time 
when  the  air  was  full  of  reform.  Robert  Owen  of 
Lanark  came  hither  from  England  in  1845,  and 
read  lectures  or  held  conversations  wherever  he 
found  listeners;  the  most  amiable,  sanguine  and 
candid  of  men.  He  had  not  the  least  doubt  that 
he  had  hit  on  a  right  and  perfect  socialism,  or  that 
all  mankind  would  adopt  it.  He  was  then  seventy 
years  old,  and  being  asked,  "  Well,  Mr.  Owen,  who 
is  your  disciple  ?  How  many  men  are  there  pos- 
sessed of  your  views  who  will  remain  after  you  are 


LIFE  AND  LETTERS  IN  NEW  ENGLAND.   327 

gone,  to  put  them  in  practice  ?  "  "  Not  one,"  was 
his  reply.  Robert  Owen  knew  Fourier  in  his  old 
age.  He  said  that  Fourier  learned  of  him  all 
the  truth  he  had  ;  the  rest  of  his  system  was  imag- 
ination, and  the  imagination  of  a  banker.  Owen 
made  the  best  impression  by  his  rare  benevolence. 
His  love  of  men  made  us  forget  his  "  Three  Errors." 
His  charitable  construction  of  men  and  their  actions 
was  invariable.  He  was  the  better  Christian  in 
his  controversy  with  Christians,  and  he  interpreted 
with  great  generosity  the  acts  of  the  "  Holy  Alli- 
ance," and  Prince  Metternich,  with  whom  the  per- 
severing doctrinaire  had  obtained  interviews; 
"  Ah,"  he  said,  "  you  may  depend  on  it  there  are 
as  tender  hearts  and  as  much  good  will  to  serve 
men,  in  palaces,  as  in  colleges." 

And  truly  I  honor  the  generous  ideas  of  the  So- 
cialists, the  magnificence  of  their  theories,  and  the 
enthusiasm  with  which  they  have  been  urged. 
They  appeared  the  inspired  men  of  their  time. 
Mr.  Owen  preached  his  doctrine  of  labor  and  re- 
ward, with  the  fidelity  and  devotion  of  a  saint,  to 
the  slow  ears  of  his  generation.  Fourier,  almost 
as  wonderful  an  example  of  the  mathematical  mind 
of  France  as  La  Place  or  Napoleon,  turned  a  truly 
vast  arithmetic  to  the  question  of  social  misery,  and 
has  put  men  under  the  obligation  which  a  generous 
mind   always    confers,  of  conceiving    magnificent 


328  HISTORIC  NOTES  OF 

hopes  and  making  great  demands  as  the  right  of 
man.  He  took  his  measure  of  that  which  all  should 
and  might  enjoy,  from  no  soup-society  or  charity- 
concert,  but  from  the  refinements  of  palaces,  the 
wealth  of  universities,  and  the  triumphs  of  artists. 
He  thought  nobly.  A  man  is  entitled  to  pure  air, 
and  to  the  air  of  good  conversation  in  his  bringing 
up,  and  not,  as  we  or  so  many  of  us,  to  the  poor- 
smell  and  musty  chambers,  cats  and  fools.  Fourier 
carried  a  whole  French  Revolution  in  his  head,  and 
much  more.  Here  was  arithmetic  on  a  huge  scale. 
His  ciphering  goes  where  ciphering  never  went  be- 
fore, namely,  into  stars,  atmospheres,  and  animals, 
and  men  and  women,  and  classes  of  every  character. 
It  was  the  most  entertaining  of  French  romances, 
and  could  not  but  suggest  vast  possibilities  of  re- 
form to  the  coldest  and  least  sanguine. 

We  had  an  opportunity  of  learning  something  of 
these  Socialists  and  their  theory,  from  the  indefat- 
igable apostle  of  the  sect  in  New  York,  Albert 
Brisbane.  Mr.  Brisbane  pushed  his  doctrine  with 
all  the  force  of  memory,  talent,  honest  faith  and 
importunacy.  As  we  listened  to  his  exposition  it 
appeared  to  us  the  sublime  of  mechanical  philoso- 
phy ;  for  the  system  was  the  perfection  of  arrange- 
ment and  contrivance.  The  force  of  arrangement 
could  no  farther  go.  The  merit  of  the  plan  was 
that  it  was  a  system ;  that  it  had  not  the  partiality 


LIFE  AND  LETTERS  IN  NEW  ENGLAND.   329 

and  hint-and-fragment  character  of  most  popular 
schemes,  but  was  coherent  and  comprehensive  of 
facts  to  a  wonderful  degree.  It  was  not  daunted 
by  distance,  or  magnitude,  or  remoteness  of  any 
sort,  but  strode  about  nature  with  a  giant's  step, 
and  skipped  no  fact,  but  wove  its  large  Ptolemaic 
web  of  cycle  and  epicycle,  of  phalanx  and  phalan- 
stery, with  laudable  assiduity.  Mechanics  were 
pushed  so  far  as  fairly  to  meet  spiritualism.  One 
could  not  but  be  struck  with  strange  coincidences 
betwixt  Fourier  and  Swedenborg.  Genius  hitherto 
has  been  shamefully  misapplied,  a  mere  trifler.  It 
must  now  set  itself  to  raise  the  social  condition  of 
man  and  to  redress  the  disorders  of  the  planet  he 
inhabits.  The  Desert  of  Sahara,  the  Campagna  di 
Roma,  the  frozen  Polar  circles,  which  by  their  pes- 
tilential or  hot  or  cold  airs  poison  the  temperate  re- 
gions, accuse  man.  Society,  concert,  co-operation, 
is  the  secret  of  the  coming  Paradise.  By  reason  of 
the  isolation  of  men  at  the  present  day,  all  work  is 
drudgery.  By  concert  and  the  allowing  each  la- 
borer to  choose  his  own  work,  it  becomes  pleasure. 
"Attractive  Industry"  would  speedily  subdue,  by 
adventurous  scientific  and  persistent  tillage,  the 
pestilential  tracts ;  would  equalize  temperature, 
give  health  to  the  globe  and  cause  the  earth  to  yield 
"healthy  imponderable  fluids"  to  the  solar  system, 
as  now  it  yields  noxious  fluids.     The  hysena,  the 


330  HISTORIC  NOTES  OF 

jackal,  the  gnat,  the  bug,  the  flea,  were  all  benef- 
icent parts  of  the  system ;  the  good  Fourier  knew 
what  those  creatures  should  have  been,  had  not  the 
mould  slipped,  through  the  bad  state  of  the  atmos- 
phere ;  caused  no  doubt  by  the  same  vicious  impon- 
derable fluids.  All  these  shall  be  redressed  by  hu- 
man culture,  and  the  useful  goat  and  dog  and  inno- 
cent poetical  moth,  or  the  wood-tick  to  consume 
decomposing  wood,  shall  take  their  place.  It  takes 
sixteen  hundred  and  eighty  men  to  make  one  Man, 
complete  in  all  the  faculties ;  that  is,  to  be  sure 
that  you  have  got  a  good  joiner,  a  good  cook,  a 
barber,  a  poet,  a  judge,  an  umbrella-maker,  a  mayor 
and  alderman,  and  so  on.  Your  community  should 
consist  of  two  thousand  persons,  to  prevent  acci- 
dents of  omission  ;  and  each  community  should 
take  up  six  thousand  acres  of  land.  Now  fancy 
the  earth  planted  with  fifties  and  hundreds  of  these 
phalanxes  side  by  side,  —  what  tillage,  what  arch- 
itecture, what  refectories,  what  dormitories,  what 
reading-rooms,  what  concerts,  what  lectures,  what 
gardens,  what  baths !  What  is  not  in  one  will  be 
in  another,  and  many  will  be  within  easy  distance. 
Then  know  you  one  and  all,  that  Constantinople 
is  the  natural  capital  of  the  globe.  There,  in  the 
Golden  Horn,  will  the  Arch-Phalanx  be  estab- 
lished; there  will  the  Omniarch  reside.  Aladdin 
and  his  magician,  or  the  beautiful  Scheherezade 


LIFE  AND  LETTERS  IN  NEW  ENGLAND.   331 

can  alone,  in  these  prosaic  times  before  the  sight, 
describe  the  material  splendors  collected  there. 
Poverty  shall  be  abolished;  deformity,  stupidity 
and  crime  shall  be  no  more.  Genius,  grace,  art, 
shall  abound,  and  it  is  not  to  be  doubted  but  that 
in  the  reign  of  "  Attractive  Industry  "  all  men  will 
speak  in  blank  verse. 

Certainly  we  listened  with  great  pleasure  to  such 
gay  and  magnificent  pictures.  The  ability  and 
earnestness  of  the  advocate  and  his  friends,  the 
comprehensiveness  of  their  theory,  its  apparent  di- 
rectness of  proceeding  to  the  end  they  would  se- 
cure, the  indignation  they  felt  and  uttered  in  the 
presence  of  so  much  social  misery,  commanded  our 
attention  and  respect.  It  contained  so  much  truth, 
and  promised  in  the  attempts  that  shall  be  made  to 
realize  it  so  much  valuable  instruction,  that  we  are 
engaged  to  observe  every  step  of  its  progress.  Yet 
in  spite  of  the  assurances  of  its  friends  that  it  was 
new  and  widely  discriminated  from  all  other  plans 
for  the  regeneration  of  society,  we  could  not  exempt 
it  from  the  criticism  which  we  apply  to  so  many 
projects  for  reform  with  which  the  brain  of  the  age 
teems.  Our  feeling  was  that  Fourier  had  skipped 
no  fact  but  one,  namely  Life.  He  treats  man  as  a 
plastic  thing,  something  that  may  be  put  up  or 
down,  ripened  or  retarded,  moulded,  polished,  made 
into  solid  or  fluid  or  gas,  at  the  will  of  the  leader  ,• 


332  HISTORIC  NOTES  OF 

or  perhaps  as  a  vegetable,  from  which,  though  now 
a  poor  crab,  a  very  good  peach  can  by  manure  and 
exposure  be  in  time  produced,  —  but  skips  the  fac- 
ulty of  life,  which  spawns  and  scorns  system  and 
system-makers  ;  which  eludes  all  conditions ;  which 
makes  or  supplants  a  thousand  phalanxes  and  New 
Harmonies  with  each  pulsation.  There  is  an  order 
in  which  in  a  sound  mind  the  faculties  always  ap- 
pear, and  which,  according  to  the  strength  of  the 
individual,  they  seek  to  realize  in  the  surrounding 
world.  The  value  of  Fourier's  system  is  that  it  is 
a  statement  of  such  an  order  externized,  or  carried 
outward  into  its  correspondence  in  facts.  The 
mistake  is  that  this  particular  order  and  series  is 
to  be  imposed,  by  force  or  preaching  and  votes,  on 
all  men,  and  carried  into  rigid  execution.  But 
what  is  true  and  good  must  not  only  be  begun  by 
life,  but  must  be  conducted  to  its  issues  by  life. 
Could  not  the  conceiver  of  this  design  have  also  be- 
lieved that  a  similar  model  lay  in  every  mind,  and 
that  the  method  of  each  associate  might  be  trusted, 
as  well  as  that  of  his  particular  Committee  and 
General  Office,  No.  200  Broadway  ?  Nay,  that  it 
would  be  better  to  say,  Let  us  be  lovers  and  ser- 
vants of  that  which  is  just,  and  straightway  every 
man  becomes  a  centre  of  a  holy  and  beneficent  re- 
public, which  he  sees  to  include  all  men  in  its  law, 
like  that  of  Plato,  and  of  Christ.     Before  such  a 


LIFE  AND  LETTERS  IN  NE  W  ENGLAND.   333 

man  the  whole  world  becomes  Fourierized  or  Christ- 
ized  or  humanized,  and  in  obedience  to  his  most 
private  being  he  finds  himself,  according  to  his  pre- 
sentiment, though  against  all  sensuous  probability, 
acting  in  strict  concert  with  all  others  who  followed 
their  private  light. 

Yet,  in  a  day  of  small,  sour  and  fierce  schemes, 
one  is  admonished  and  cheered  by  a  project  of  such 
friendly  aims  and  of  such  bold  and  generous  pro- 
portion ;  there  is  an  intellectual  courage  and 
strength  in  it  which  is  superior  and  commanding  ; 
it  certifies  the  presence  of  so  much  truth  in  the 
theory,  and  in  so  far  is  destined  to  be  fact. 

It  argued  singular  courage,  the  adoption  of  Fou- 
rier's system,  to  even  a  limited  extent,  with  his 
books  lying  before  the  world  only  defended  by  the 
thin  veil  of  the  French  language.  The  Stoic  said, 
Forbear,  Fourier  said,  Indulge.  Fourier  was  of  the 
opinion  of  St.  Evremond  ;  abstinence  from  pleas- 
ure appeared  to  him  a  great  sin.  Fourier  was  very 
French  indeed.  He  labored  under  a  misapprehen- 
sion of  the  nature  of  women.  The  Fourier  mar- 
riage was  a  calculation  how  to  secure  the  greatest 
amount  of  kissing  that  the  infirmity  of  human  con- 
stitution admitted.  It  was  false  and  prurient,  full 
of  absurd  French  superstitions  about  women  ;  igno- 
rant how  serious  and  how  moral  their  nature  al- 
ways is  ;  how  chaste  is  their  organization  ;  how 
lawful  a  class. 


334  HISTORIC  NOTES  OF 

It  is  the  worst  of  community  that  it  must  inevi- 
tably transform  into  charlatans  the  leaders,  by  the 
endeavor  continually  to  meet  the  expectation  and 
admiration  of  this  eager  crowd  of  men  and  women 
seeking  they  know  not  what.  Unless  he  have  a 
Cossack  roughness  of  clearing  himself  of  what  be- 
longs not,  charlatan  he  must  be. 

It  was  easy  to  see  what  must  be  the  fate  of  this 
fine  system  in  any  serious  and  comprehensive  at- 
tempt to  set  it  on  foot  in  this  country.  As  soon  as 
our  people  got  wind  of  the  doctrine  of  Marriage 
held  by  this  master,  it  would  fall  at  once  into  the 
hands  of  a  lawless  crew  who  would  flock  in  troops 
to  so  fair  a  game,  and,  like  the  dreams  of  poetic 
people  on  the  first  outbreak  of  the  old  French  Rev- 
olution, so  theirs  would  disappear  in  a  slime  of 
mire  and  blood. 

There  is  of  course  to  every  theory  a  tendency  to 
run  to  an  extreme,  and  to  forget  the  limitations.  In 
our  free  institutions,  where  every  man  is  at  liberty 
to  choose  his  home  and  his  trade,  and  all  possible 
modes  of  working  and  gaining  are  open  to  him, 
fortunes  are  easily  made  by  thousands,  as  in  no 
other  country.  Then  property  proves  too  much 
for  the  man,  and  the  men  of  science,  art,  intellect, 
are  pretty  sure  to  degenerate  into  selfish  house- 
keepers, dependent  on  wine,  coffee,  furnace-heat, 
gas-light  and  fine  furniture.    Then  instantly  things 


LIFE  AND  LETTERS  IN  NEW  ENGLAND.   335 

swing  the  other  way,  and  we  suddenly  find  that 
civilization  crowed  too  soon  ;  that  what  we  bragged 
as  triumphs  were  treacheries :  that  we  have  opened 
the  wrong  door  and  let  the  enemy  into  the  castle  ; 
that  civilization  was  a  mistake  ;  that  nothing  is  so 
vulgar  as  a  great  warehouse  of  rooms  full  of  furni- 
ture and  trumpery ;  that,  in  the  circumstances,  the 
best  wisdom  were  an  auction  or  a  fire.  Since  the 
foxes  and  the  birds  have  the  right  of  it,  with  a 
warm  hole  to  keep  out  the  weather,  and  no  more, — 
a  pent-house  to  fend  the  sun  and  rain  is  the  house 
which  lays  no  tax  on  the  owner's  time  and  thoughts, 
and  which  he  can  leave,  when  the  sun  is  warm,  and 
defy  the  robber.  This  was  Thoreau's  doctrine,  who 
said  that  the  Fourierists  had  a  sense  of  duty  which 
led  them  to  devote  themselves  to  their  second-best. 
And  Thoreau  gave  in  flesh  and  blood  and  pertina- 
cious Saxon  belief  the  purest  ethics.  He  was  more 
real  and  practically  believing  in  them  than  any  of 
his  company,  and  fortified"  you  at  all  times  with  an 
affirmative  experience  which  refused  to  be  set  aside. 
Thoreau  was  in  his  own  person  a  practical  answer, 
almost  a  refutation,  to  the  theories  of  the  socialists. 
He  required  no  Phalanx,  no  Government,  no  soci- 
ety, almost  no  memory.  He  lived  extempore  from 
hour  to  hour,  like  the  birds  and  the  angels ;  brought 
every  day  a  new  proposition,  as  revolutionary  as 
that  of  yesterday,  but  different :  the  only  man  of 


336  HISTORIC  NOTES  OF 

leisure  in  his  town ;  and  his  independence  made  all 
others  look  like  slaves.  He  was  a  good  Abbot 
Sampson,  and  carried  a  counsel  in  his  breast. 
"  Again  and  again  I  congratulate  myself  on  my  so- 
called  poverty,  I  could  not  overstate  this  advan- 
tage." "  What  you  call  bareness  and  poverty,  is 
to  me  simplicity.  God  could  not  be  unkind  to  me 
if  he  should  try.  I  love  best  to  have  each  thing  in 
its  season  only,  and  enjoy  doing  without  it  at  all 
other  times.  It  is  the  greatest  of  all  advantages  to 
enjoy  no  advantage  at  all.  I  have  never  got  over 
my  surprise  that  I  should  have  been  born  into  the 
most  estimable  place  in  all  the  world,  and  in  the 
very  nick  of  time  too."  There's  an  optimist  for 
you. 

I  regard  these  philanthropists  as  themselves  the 
effects  of  the  age  in  which  we  live,  and,  in  common 
with  so  many  other  good  facts,  the  efflorescence  of 
the  period,  and  predicting  a  good  fruit  that  ripens. 
They  were  not  the  creators  they  believed  them- 
selves, but  they  were  unconscious  prophets  of  a  true 
state  of  society ;  one  which  the  tendencies  of  na- 
ture lead  unto,  one  which  always  establishes  itself 
for  the  sane  soul,  though  not  in  that  manner  in 
which  they  paint  it;  but  they  were  describers  of 
that  which  is  really  being  done.  The  large  cities 
are  phalansteries  ;  and  the  theorists  drew  all  their 
argument  from  facts  already  taking  place  in  our 


LIFE  AND  LETTERS  IN  NEW  ENGLAND.   337 

experience.  The  cheap  way  is  to  make  every  man 
do  what  he  was  born  for.  One  merchant  to  whom 
I  described  the  Fourier  project,  thought  it  must 
not  only  succeed,  but  that  agricultural  association 
must  presently  fix  the  price  of  bread,  and  drive 
single  farmers  into  association  in  self-defence,  as 
the  great  commercial  and  manufacturing  compa- 
nies had  done.  Society  in  England  and  in  America 
is  trying  the  experiment  again  in  small  pieces,  in 
co-operative  associations,  in  cheap  eating-houses,  as 
well  as  in  the  economies  of  club-houses  and  in 
cheap  reading-rooms. 

It  chanced  that  here  in  one  family  were  two 
brothers,  one  a  brilliant  and  fertile  inventor,  and 
close  by  him  his  own  brother,  a  man  of  business, 
who  knew  how  to  direct  his  faculty  and  make  it 
instantly  and  permanently  lucrative.  Why  could 
not  the  like  partnership  be  formed  between  the  in- 
ventor and  the  man  of  executive  talent  everywhere  ? 
Each  man  of  thought  is  surrounded  by  wiser  men 
than  he,  if  they  cannot  write  as  well.  Cannot  he 
and  they  combine  ?  Talents  supplement  each  other. 
Beaumont  and  Fletcher  and  many  French  novel- 
ists have  known  how  to  utilize  such  partnerships. 
Why  not  have  a  larger  one,  and  with  more  various 
members  ? 

Housekeepers  say,  "  There  are  a  thousand  things 
to   everything,"   and  if  one  must  study  all  the 

vol.  x.  22 


338  HISTORIC  NOTES   OF 

strokes  to  be  laid,  all  the  faults  to  be  shunned  in  a 
building  or  work  of  art,  of  its  keeping,  its  compo- 
sition, its  site,  its  color,  there  would  be  no  end. 
But  the  architect,  acting  under  a  necessity  to  build 
the  house  for  its  purpose,  finds  himself  helped,  he 
knows  not  how,  into  all  these  merits  of  detail,  and 
steering  clear,  though  in  the  dark,  of  those  dangers 
which  might  have  shipwrecked  him. 

BROOK   FARM. 

The  West  Roxbury  association  was  formed  in 
1841,  by  a  society  of  members,  men  and  women, 
who  bought  a  farm  in  West  Roxbury,  of  about  two 
hundred  acres,  and  took  possession  of  the  place  in 
April.  Mr.  George  Ripley  was  the  President,  and 
I  think  Mr.  Charles  Dana  (afterwards  well  known 
as  one  of  the  editors  of  the  New  York  Tribune), 
was  the  secretary.  Many  members  took  shares  by 
paying  money,  others  held  shares  by  their  labor. 
An  old  house  on  the  place  was  enlarged,  and  three 
new  houses  built.  William  Allen  was  at  first  and 
for  some  time  the  head  farmer,  and  the  work  was 
distributed  in  orderly  committees  to  the  men  and 
women.  There  were  many  employments  more  or 
less  lucrative  found  for,  or  brought  hither  by 
these  members,  — shoemakers,  joiners,  sempstresses. 
They  had  good  scholars  among  them,  and  so  re- 
ceived pupils  for  their  education.     The  parents  of 


LIFE  AND  LETTERS  IN  NEW  ENGLAND.  339 

the  children  in  some  instances  wished  to  live  there, 
and  were  received  as  boarders.  Many  persons  at- 
tracted by  the  beauty  of  the  place  and  the  culture 
and  ambition  of  the  community,  joined  them  as 
boarders,  and  lived  there  for  years.  I  think  the 
numbers  of  this  mixed  community  soon  reached 
eighty  or  ninety  souls. 

It  was  a  noble  and  generous  movement  in  the 
projectors,  to  try  an  experiment  of  better  living. 
They  had  the  feeling  that  our  ways  of  living  were 
too  conventional  and  expensive,  not  allowing  each 
to  do  what  he  had  a  talent  for,  and  not  permitting 
men  to  combine  cultivation  of  mind  and  heart  with 
a  reasonable  amount  of  daily  labor.  At  the  same 
time,  it  was  an  attempt  to  lift  others  with  them- 
selves, and  to  share  the  advantages  they  should  at- 
tain, with  others  now  deprived  of  them. 

There  was  no  doubt  great  variety  of  character 
and  purpose  in  the  members  of  the  community.  It 
consisted  in  the  main  of  young  people,  —  few  of 
middle  age,  and  none  old.  Those  who  inspired 
and  organized  it  were  of  course  persons  impatient 
of  the  routine,  the  uniformity,  perhaps  they  would 
say  the  squalid  contentment  of  society  around 
them,  which  was  so  timid  and  skeptical  of  any 
progress.  One  would  say  then  that  impulse  was 
the  rule  in  the  society,  without  centripetal  balance ; 
perhaps  it  would  not  be  severe  to  say,  intellectual 


340  HISTORIC  NOTES  OF 

sans-culottisni,  an  impatience  of  the  formal,  rou« 
tinary  character  of  our  educational,  religious,  social 
and  economical  life  in  Massachusetts.  Yet  there 
was  immense  hope  in  these  young  people.  There 
was  nobleness ;  there  were  self-sacrificing  victims 
who  compensated  for  the  levity  and  rashness  of 
their  companions.  The  young  people  lived  a  great 
deal  in  a  short  time,  and  came  forth  some  of  them 
perhaps  with  shattered  constitutions.  And  a  few 
grave  sanitary  influences  of  character  were  happily 
there,  which,  I  was  assured,  were  always  felt. 

George  W.  Curtis  of  New  York,  and  his  brother, 
of  English  Oxford,  were  members  of  the  family 
from  the  first.  Theodore  Parker,  the  near  neigh- 
bor of  the  farm  and  the  most  intimate  friend  of 
Mr.  Ripley,  was  a  frequent  visitor.  Mr.  Ichabod 
Morton  of  Plymouth,  a  plain  man  formerly  en- 
gaged through  many  years  in  the  fisheries  with 
success,  —  eccentric,  with  a  persevering  interest  in 
Education,  and  of  a  very  democratic  religion,  came 
and  built  a  house  on  the  farm,  and  he,  or  members 
of  his  family,  continued  there  to  the  end.  Marga- 
ret Fuller,  with  her  joyful  conversation  and  large 
sympathy,  was  often  a  guest,  and  always  in  corre- 
spondence with  her  friends.  Many  ladies,  whom 
to  name  were  to  praise,  gave  character  and  varied 
attraction  to  the  place. 

In  and  around  Brook  Farm,  whether  as  mem- 


LIFE  AND  LETTERS  IN  NEW  ENGLAND.   341 

bers,  boarders,  or  visitors,  were  many  remarkable 
persons,  for  character,  intellect,  or  accomplish- 
ments. I  recall  one  youth  of  the  subtlest  mind,  I 
believe  I  must  say  the  subtlest  observer  and  diviner 
of  character  I  ever  met,  living,  reading,  writing, 
talking  there,  perhaps  as  long  as  the  colony  held 
together  ;  his  mind  fed  and  overfed  by  whatever 
is  exalted  in  genius,  whether  in  Poetry  or  Art,  in 
Drama  or  Music,  or  in  social  accomplishment  and 
elegancy;  a  man  of  no  employment  or  practical 
aims,  a  student  and  philosopher,  who  found  his 
daily  enjoyment  not  with  the  elders  or  his  exact 
contemporaries  so  much  as  with  the  fine  boys  who 
were,  skating  and  playing  ball  or  bird-hunting; 
forming  the  closest  friendships  with  such,  and  find- 
ing his  delight  in  the  petulant  heroisms  of  boys ; 
yet  was  he  the  chosen  counsellor  to  whom  the  guar- 
dians would  repair  on  any  hitch  or  difficulty  that 
occurred,  and  draw  from  him  a  wise  counsel.  A 
fine,  subtle,  inward  genius,  puny  in  body  and  habit 
as  a  girl,  yet  with  an  aplomb  like  a  general,  never 
disconcerted.  He  lived  and  thought,  in  1842,  such 
worlds  of  life  ;  all  hinging  on  the  thought  of  Being 
or  Reality  as  opposed  to  consciousness ;  hating  in- 
tellect with  the  ferocity  of  a  Swedenborg.  He  was 
the  Abb6  or  spiritual  father,  from  his  religious 
bias.  His  reading  lay  in  iEschylus,  Plato,  Dante, 
Calderon,  Shakspeare,  and  in  modern  novels  and 


342  HISTORIC  NOTES  OF 

romances  of  merit.  There  too  was  Hawthorne, 
with  his  cold  yet  gentle  genius,  if  he  failed  to  do 
justice  to  this  temporary  home.  There  was  the  ac- 
complished Doctor  of  Music,  who  has  presided  over 
its  literature  ever  since  in  our  metropolis.  Rev. 
William  Henry  Channing,  now  of  London,  was 
from  the  first  a  student  of  Socialism  in  France  and 
England,  and  in  perfect  sympathy  with  this  ex- 
periment. An  English  baronet,  Sir  John  Cald- 
well, was  a  frequent  visitor,  and  more  or  less  di- 
rectly interested  in  the  leaders  and  the  success. 

Hawthorne  drew  some  sketches,  not  happily,  as 
I  think ;  I  should  rather  say,  quite  unworthy  of 
his  genius.  No  friend  who  knew  Margaret  Fuller 
could  recognize  her  rich  and  brilliant  genius  under 
the  dismal  mask  which  the  public  fancied  was 
meant  for  her  in  that  disagreeable  story. 

The  Founders  of  Brook  Farm  should  have  this 
praise,  that  they  made  what  all  people  try  to  make, 
an  agreeable  place  to  live  in.  All  comers,  even 
the  most  fastidious,  found  it  the  pleasantest  of  resi- 
dences. It  is  certain  that  freedom  from  household 
routine,  variety  of  character  and  talent,  variety  of 
work,  variety  of  means  of  thought  and  instruction, 
art,  music,  poetry,  reading,  masquerade,  did  not 
permit  sluggishness  or  despondency;  broke  up 
routine.  There  is  agreement  in  the  testimony  that 
it  was,  to  most   of  the   associates,  education;   to 


LIFE  AND  LETTERS  IN  NEW  ENGLAND.   343 

many,  the  most  important  period  of  their  life,  the 
birth  of  valued  friendships,  their  first  acquaintance 
with  the  riches  of  conversation,  their  training  in 
behavior.  The  art  of  letter-writing,  it  is  said,  was 
immensely  cultivated.  Letters  were  always  flying 
not  only  from  house  to  house,  but  from  room  to 
room.  It  was  a  perpetual  picnic,  a  French  Re  vo- 
lution in  small,  an  Age  of  Reason  in  a  patty-pan. 

In  the  American  social  communities,  the  gossip 
found  such  vent  and  sway  as  to  become  despotic. 
The  institutions  were  whispering-galleries,  in  which 
the  adored  Saxon  privacy  was  lost.  Married  women 
I  believe  uniformly  decided  against  the  community. 
It  was  to  them  like  the  brassy  and  lacquered  life  in 
hotels.  The  common  school  was  well  enough,  but 
to  the  common  nursery  they  had  grave  objections. 
Eggs  might  be  hatched  in  ovens,  but  the  hen  on 
her  own  account  much  preferred  the  old  way.  A 
hen  without  her  chickens  was  but  half  a  hen. 

It  was  a  curious  experience  of  the  patrons  and 
leaders  of  this  noted  community,  in  which  the 
agreement  with  many  parties  was  that  they  should 
give  so  many  hours  of  instruction  in  mathematics, 
in  music,  in  moral  and  intellectual  philosophy,  and 
so  forth,  —  that  in  every  instance  the  new  comers 
showed  themselves  keenly  alive  to  the  advantages 
of  the  society,  and  were  sure  to  avail  themselves  of 
every  means  of  instruction ;  their  knowledge  was 


344  HISTORIC  NOTES  OF 

increased,  their  manners  refined,  —  bnt  they  be- 
came in  that  proportion  averse  to  labor,  and  were 
charged  by  the  heads  of  the  departments  with  a 
certain  indolence  and  selfishness. 

In  practice  it  is  always  found  that  virtue  is  oc- 
casional, spotty,  and  not  linear  or  cubic.  Good 
people  are  as  bad  as  rogues  if  steady  performance 
is  claimed;  the  conscience  of  the  conscientious 
runs  in  veins,  and  the  most  punctilious  in  some 
particulars  are  latitudinarian  in  others.  It  was 
very  gently  said  that  people  on  whom  beforehand 
all  persons  would  put  the  utmost  reliance  were  not 
responsible.  They  saw  the  necessity  that  the  work 
must  be  done,  and  did  it  not,  and  it  of  course  fell 
to  be  done  by  the  few  religious  workers.  No  doubt 
there  was  in  many  a  certain  strength  drawn  from 
the  fury  of  dissent.  Thus  Mr.  Kipley  told  Theo- 
dore Parker,  "There  is  your  accomplished  friend 

:  he  would  hoe  corn  all  Sunday  if  I  would  let 

him,  but  all  Massachusetts  could  not  make  him  do 
it  on  Monday." 

Of  course  every  visitor  found  that  there  was  a 
comic  side  to  this  Paradise  of  shepherds  and  shep- 
herdesses. There  was  a  stove  in  every  chamber, 
and  every  one  might  burn  as  much  wood  as  he  or 
she  would  saw.  The  ladies  took  cold  on  washing- 
day  ;  so  it  was  ordained  that  the  gentlemen-shep- 
herds should  wring  and  hang  out  clothes  ;  which 


LIFE  AND  LETTERS  IN  NEW  ENGLAND.  345 

they  punctually  did.  And  it  would  sometimes  oc- 
cur that  when  they  danced  in  the  evening,  clothes- 
pins dropped  plentifully  from  their  pockets.  The 
country  members  naturally  were  surprised  to  ob- 
serve that  one  man  ploughed  all  day  and  one  looked 
out  of  the  window  all  day,  and  perhaps  drew  his 
picture,  and  both  received  at  night  the  same  wages. 
One  would  meet  also  some  modest  pride  in  their 
advanced  condition,  signified  by  a  frequent  phrase, 
"  Before  we  came  out  of  civilization." 

The  question  which  occurs  to  you  had  occurred 
much  earlier  to  Fourier :  "  How  in  this  charming 
Elysium  is  the  dirty  work  to  be  done  ? "  And 
long  ago  Fourier  had  exclaimed,  "  Ah  !  I  have  it," 
and  jumped  with  joy.  "Don't  you  see,"  he  cried, 
"  that  nothing  so  delights  the  young  Caucasian 
child  as  dirt  ?  See  the  mud-pies  that  all  children 
will  make  if  you  will  let  them.  See  how  much 
more  joy  they  find  in  pouring  their  pudding  on 
the  table-cloth  than  into  their  beautiful  mouths. 
The  children  from  six  to  eight,  organized  into  com- 
panies with  flags  and  uniforms,  shall  do  this  last 
function  of   civilization." 

In  Brook  Farm  was  this  peculiarity,  that  there 
was  no  head.  In  every  family  is  the  father;  in 
every  factory,  a  foreman  ;  in  a  shop,  a  master  ;  in 
a  boat,  the  skipper ;  but  in  this  Farm,  no  author- 
ity ;  each  was  master  or  mistress  of  his  or  her  ao 


346  HISTORIC  NOTES  OF 

tions  ;  happy,  hapless  anarchists.  They  expressed, 
after  much  perilous  experience,  the  conviction  that 
plain  dealing  was  the  best  defence  of  manners  and 
moral  between  the  sexes.  People  cannot  live  to- 
gether in  any  but  necessary  ways.  The  only  can- 
didates who  will  present  themselves  will  be  those 
who  have  tried  the  experiment  of  independence 
and  ambition,  and  have  failed ;  and  none  others 
will  barter  for  the  most  comfortable  equality  the 
chance  of  superiority.  Then  all  communities  have 
quarrelled.  Few  people  can  live  together  on  their 
merits.  There  must  be  kindred,  or  mutual  econ- 
omy, or  a  common  interest  in  their  business,  or 
other  external  tie. 

The  society  at  Brook  Farm  existed,  I  think, 
about  six  or  seven  years,  and  then  broke  up,  the 
Farm  was  sold,  and  I  believe  all  the  partners  came 
out  with  pecuniary  loss.  Some  of  them  had  spent 
on  it  the  accumulations  of  years.  I  suppose  they 
all,  at  the  moment,  regarded  it  as  a  failure.  I  do 
not  think  they  can  so  regard  it  now,  but  probably 
as  an  important  chapter  in  their  experience  which 
has  been  of  lifelong  value.  What  knowledge  of 
themselves  and  of  each  other,  what  various  practical 
wisdom,  what  personal  power,  what  studies  of  char- 
acter, what  accumulated  culture  many  of  the  mem- 
bers  owed  to  it  !  What  mutual  measure  they  took 
of  each  other  !     It  was  a  close  union,  like  that  in  a 


LIFE  AND  LETTERS  IN  NEW  ENGLAND.     347 

ship's  cabin,  of  clergymen,  young  collegians,  mer- 
chants, mechanics,  farmers'  sons  and  daughters,  with 
men  and  women  of  rare  opportunities  and  delicate 
culture,  yet  assembled  there  by  a  sentiment  which 
all  shared,  some  of  them  hotly  shared,  of  the  honesty 
of  a  life  of  labor  and  of  the  beauty  of  a  life  of  hu- 
manity. The  yeoman  saw  refined  manners  in  per- 
sons who  were  his  friends  ;  and  the  lady  or  the  ro- 
mantic scholar  saw  the  continuous  strength  and 
faculty  in  people  who  would  have  disgusted  them 
but  that  these  powers  were  now  spent  in  the  direc- 
tion of  their  own  theory  of  life. 

I  recall  these  few  selected  facts,  none  of  them  of 
much  independent  interest,  but  symptomatic  of  the 
times  and  country.  I  please  myself  with  the 
thought  that  our  American  mind  is  not  now  eccen- 
tric or  rude  in  its  strength,  but  is  beginning  to  show 
a  quiet  power,  drawn  from  wide  and  abundant 
sources,  proper  to  a  Continent  and  to  an  educated 
people.  If  I  have  owed  much  to  the  special  influ- 
ences I  have  indicated,  I  am  not  less  aware  of  that 
excellent  and  increasing  circle  of  masters  in  arts 
and  in  song  and  in  science,  who  cheer  the  intellect 
of  our  cities  and  this  country  to-day,  —  whose  ge- 
nius is  not  a  lucky  accident,  but  normal,  and  with 
broad  foundation  of  culture,  and  so  inspires  the 
hope  of  steady  strength  advancing  on  itself,  and  a 
day  without  night. 


THE  CHARDON  STREET  CONVENTION. 


THE  CHARDON  STREET  CONVENTION. 


In  the  month  of  November,  1840,  a  Convention 
of  Friends  of  Universal  Reform  assembled  in  the 
Chardon  Street  Chapel  in  Boston,  in  obedience  to 
a  call  in  the  newspapers,  signed  by  a  few  individu- 
als, inviting  all  persons  to  a  public  discussion  of  the 
institutions  of  the  Sabbath,  the  Church  and  the 
Ministry.  The  Convention  organized  itself  by  the 
choice  of  Edmund  Quincy  as  Moderator,  spent 
three  days  in  the  consideration  of  the  Sabbath,  and 
adjourned  to  a  day  in  March  of  the  following  year, 
for  the  discussion  of  the  second  topic.  In  March, 
accordingly,  a  three-days'  sessions  was  holden  in  the 
same  place,  on  the  subject  of  the  Church,  and  a 
third  meeting  fixed  for  the  following  November, 
which  was  accordingly  holden  ;  and  the  Convention 
debated,  for  three  days  again,  the  remaining  subject 
of  the  Priesthood.  This  Convention  never  printed 
any  report  of  its  deliberations,  nor  pretended  to 
arrive  at  any  result  by  the  expression  of  its  sense  in 
formal  resolutions ;  —  the  professed  objects  of  those 
1  The  Dial,  vol.  iii.,  p.  100. 


352      THE  CHARDON  STREET  CONVENTION. 

persons  who  felt  the  greatest  interest  in  its  meet- 
ings being  simply  the  elucidation  of  truth  through 
free  discussion.  The  daily  newspapers  reported,  at 
the  time,  brief  sketches  of  the  course  of  proceedings, 
and  the  remarks  of  the  principal  speakers.  These 
meetings  attracted  a  great  deal  of  public  attention, 
and  were  spoken  of  in  different  circles  in  every  note 
of  hope,  of  sympathy,  of  joy,  of  alarm,  of  abhorrence 
and  of  merriment.  The  composition  of  the  assem- 
bly was  rich  and  various.  The  singularity  and  lati- 
tude of  the  summons  drew  together,  from  all  parts 
of  New  England  and  also  from  the  Middle  States, 
men  of  every  shade  of  opinion  from  the  straitest 
orthodoxy  to  the  wildest  heresy,  and  many  persons 
whose  church  was  a  church  of  one  member  only. 
A  great  variety  of  dialect  and  of  costume  was  no- 
ticed ;  a  great  deal  of  confusion,  eccentricity,  and 
freak  appeared,  as  well  as  of  zeal  and  enthusiasm. 
If  the  assembly  was  disorderly,  it  was  picturesque. 
Madmen,  madwomen,  men  with  beards,  Dunkers, 
Muggletonians,  Come-outers,  Groaners,  Agrarians, 
Seventh-day-Baptists,  Quakers,  Abolitionists,  Cal- 
vinists,  Unitarians  and  Philosophers,  —  all  came 
successively  to  the  top,  and  seized  their  moment,  if 
not  their  hour,  wherein  to  chide,  or  pray,  or  preach, 
or  protest.  The  faces  were  a  study.  The  most 
daring  innovators  and  the  champions -until -death 
of  the  old  cause  sat  side  by  side.     The  still-living 


THE  CEARDON  STREET  CONVENTION.    353 

merit  of  the  oldest  New  England  families,  glow- 
ing yet  after  several  generations,  encountered  the 
founders  of  families,  fresh  merit,  emerging,  and 
expanding  the  brows  to  a  new  breadth,  and  lighting 
a  clownish  face  with  sacred  fire.  The  assembly 
was  characterized  by  the  predominance  of  a  cer- 
tain plain,  sylvan  strength  and  earnestness,  whilst 
many  of  the  most  intellectual  and  cultivated  per- 
sons attended  its  councils.  Dr.  Channing,  Ed- 
ward Taylor,  Bronson  Alcott,  Mr.  Garrison,  Mr. 
May,  Theodore  Parker,  H.  C.  Wright,  Dr.  Osgood, 
William  Adams,  Edward  Palmer,  Jones  Very, 
Maria  W.  Chapman,  and  many  other  persons  of  a 
mystical  or  sectarian  or  philanthropic  renown,  were 
present,  and  some  of  them  participant.  And  there 
was  no  want  of  female  speakers ;  Mrs.  Little  and 
Mrs.  Lucy  Sessions  took  a  pleasing  and  memorable 
part  in  the  debate,  and  that  flea  of  Conventions, 
Mrs.  Abigail  Folsom,  was  but  too  ready  with  her 
interminable  scroll.  If  there  was  not  parliamentary 
order,  there  was  life,  and  the  assurance  of  that 
constitutional  love  for  religion  and  religious  liberty 
which,  in  all  periods,  characterizes  the  inhabitants 
of  this  part  of  America. 

There  was  a  great  deal  of  wearisome  speaking  in 
each  of  those  three-days'  sessions,  but  relieved  by 
signal  passages  of  pure  eloquence,  by  much  vigor 
of  thought,  and  especially  by  the  exhibition  of  chas» 

vol.  x.  23 


354     THE   CHARDON  STREET  CONVENTION. 

acter,  and  by  the  victories  of  character.  These 
men  and  women  were  in  search  of  something  better 
and  more  satisfying  than  a  vote  or  a  definition, 
and  they  found  what  they  sought,  or  the  pledge 
of  it,  in  the  attitude  taken  by  individuals  of  their 
number  of  resistance  to  the  insane  routine  of  par- 
liamentary usage ;  in  the  lofty  reliance  on  prin- 
ciples, and  the  prophetic  dignity  and  transfigura- 
tion which  accompanies,  even  amidst  opposition 
and  ridicule,  a  man  whose  mind  is  made  up  to  obey 
the  great  inward  Commander,  and  who  does  not 
anticipate  his  own  action,  but  awaits  confidently 
the  new  emergency  for  the  new  counsel.  By  no 
means  the  least  value  of  this  Convention,  in  our 
eye,  was  the  scope  it  gave  to  the  genius  of  Mr. 
Alcott,  and  not  its  least  instructive  lesson  was  the 
gradual  but  sure  ascendency  of  his  spirit,  in  spite 
of  the  incredulity  and  derision  with  which  he  is  at 
first  received,  and  in  spite,  we  might  add,  of  his 
own  failures.  Moreover,  although  no  decision  was 
had,  and  no  action  taken  on  all  the  great  points 
mooted  in  the  discussion,  yet  the  Convention 
brought  together  many  remarkable  persons,  face  to 
face,  and  gave  occasion  to  memorable  interviews 
and  conversations,  in  the  hall,  in  the  lobbies,  or 
around  the  doors. 


EZRA  RIPLEY,   D.   D. 


We  love  the  venerable  house 

Our  fathers  built  to  God  : 
In  Heaven  are  kept  their  grateful  vows, 

Their  dust  endears  the  sod. 

From  humble  tenements  around 

Came  up  the  pensive  train 
And  in  the  church  a  blessing  found 

That  filled  their  homes  again. 


EZRA  RIPLEY,  D.  D.* 


Ezra  Ripley  was  born  May  1,  1751  (0.  S.), 
at  Woodstock,  Connecticut.  He  was  the  fifth  of 
the  nineteen  children  of  Noah  and  Lydia  (Kent) 
Ripley.  Seventeen  of  these  nineteen  children  mar- 
ried, and  it  is  stated  that  the  mother  died  leaving 
nineteen  children,  one  hundred  and  two  grandchil- 
dren and  ninety-six  great-grandchildren.  The  fa- 
ther was  born  at  Hingham,  on  the  farm  purchased 
by  his  ancestor,  William  Ripley,  of  England,  at 
the  first  settlement  of  the  town ;  which  farm  has 
been  occupied  by  seven  or  eight  generations.  Ezra 
Ripley  followed  the  business  of  farming  till  sixteen 
years  of  age,  when  his  father  wished  him  to  be 

1  This  sketch  was  written  for  the  Social  Circle,  a  club  in 
Concord  now  more  than  a  century  old,  and  said  to  be  the  lin- 
eal descendant  of  the  Committee  of  Safety  in  the  Revolution. 
Mr.  Emerson  was  a  member  for  many  years  and  greatly  val- 
ued its  weekly  evening  meetings,  held,  during  the  winter,  at 
the  houses  of  the  members.  After  the  death  of  Dr.  Ripley, 
an  early  member  and  connected  with  him  by  marriage,  Mr. 
Emerson  was  asked  to  prepare  the  customary  Memoir  for 
the  Club  Book. 


358  EZRA  RIPLEY,  D.  Z>. 

qualified  to  teach  a  grammar  school,  not  thinking 
himself  able  to  send  one  son  to  college  without  in- 
jury to  his  other  children.  With  this  view,  the  fa- 
ther agreed  with  the  late  Rev.  Dr.  Forbes  of 
Gloucester,  then  minister  of  North  Brookfield,  to 
fit  Ezra  for  college  by  the  time  he  should  be 
twenty-one  years  of  age,  and  to  have  him  labor 
during  the  time  sufficiently  to  pay  for  his  instruc- 
tion, clothing  and  books. 

But,  when  fitted  for  college,  the  son  could  not 
be  contented  with  teaching,  which  he  had  tried  the 
preceding  winter.  He  had  early  manifested  a  de- 
sire for  learning,  and  could  not  be  satisfied  without 
a  public  education.  Always  inclined  to  notice 
ministers,  and  frequently  attempting,  when  only 
five  or  six  years  old,  to  imitate  them  by  preaching, 
now  that  he  had  become  a  professor  of  religion  he 
had  an  ardent  desire  to  be  a  preacher  of  the  gospel. 
He  had  to  encounter  great  difficulties,  but,  through 
a  kind  providence  and  the  patronage  of  Dr.  Forbes, 
he  entered  Harvard  University,  July,  1772.  The 
commencement  of  the  Revolutionary  War  greatly 
interrupted  his  education  at  college.  In  1775,  in 
his  senior  year,  the  college  was  removed  from  Cam- 
bridge to  this  town.  The  studies  were  much  broken 
up.  Many  of  the  students  entered  the  army,  and 
the  class  never  returned  to  Cambridge.  There 
were  an  unusually  large  number  of  distinguished 


EZRA  RIPLEY,  D.  D.  359 

men  in  this  class  of  1776  :  Christopher  Gore,  Gov- 
ernor of  Massachusetts  and  Senator  in  Congress ; 
Samuel  Sewall,  Chief  Justice  of  Massachusetts; 
George  Thacher,  Judge  of  the  Supreme  Court  ; 
Royall  Tyler,  Chief  Justice  of  Vermont ;  and  the 
late  learned  Dr.  Prince,  of  Salem. 

Mr.  Ripley  was  ordained  minister  of  Concord 
November  7,  1778.  He  married,  November  16, 
1780,  Mrs.  Phoebe  (Bliss)  Emerson,  then  a  widow 
of  thirty-nine,  with  five  children.  They  had  three 
children :  Samuel,  born  May  11,  1783 ;  Daniel 
Bliss,  born  August  1,  1784  ;  Sarah,  born  April  8, 
1789.     He  died  September  21,  1841. 

To  these  facts,  gathered  chiefly  from  his  own 
diary,  and  stated  nearly  in  his  own  words,  I  can 
only  add  a  few  traits  from  memory. 

He  was  identified  with  the  ideas  and  forms  of 
the  New  England  Church,  which  expired  about  the 
same  time  with  him,  so  that  he  and  his  coevals 
seemed  the  rear  guard  of  the  great  camp  and  army 
of  the  Puritans,  which,  however  in  its  last  days  de- 
clining into  formalism,  in  the  heyday  of  its  strength 
had  planted  and  liberated  America.  It  was  a  pity 
that  his  old  meeting-house  should  have  been  mod- 
ernized in  his  time.  I  am  sure  all  who  remember 
both  will  associate  his  form  with  whatever  was 
grave  and  droll  in  the  old,  cold,  unpainted,  uncar- 
peted,  square-pewed  meeting-house,  with  its  four 


360  EZRA  RIPLEY,  D.  D. 

iron-gray  deacons  in  their  little  box  under  the  pul- 
pit, —  with  Watts' s  hymns,  with  long  prayers,  rich 
with  the  diction  of  ages ;  and  not  less  with  the  re- 
port like  musketry  from  the  movable  seats.  He 
and  his  contemporaries,  the  old  New  England 
clergy,  were  believers  in  what  is  called  a  particular 
providence,  —  certainly,  as  they  held  it,  a  very  par- 
ticular providence,  —  following  the  narrowness  of 
King  David  and  the  Jews,  who  thought  the  uni- 
verse existed  only  or  mainly  for  their  church  and 
congregation.  Perhaps  I  cannot  better  illustrate 
this  tendency  than  by  citing  a  record  from  the 
diary  of  the  father  of  his  predecessor,1  the  minister 
of  Maiden,  written  in  the  blank  leaves  of  the  alma- 
nac for  the  year  1735.  The  minister  writes  against 
January  31st :  "  Bought  a  shay  for  27  pounds,  10 
shillings.  The  Lord  grant  it  may  be  a  comfort  and 
blessing  to  my  family."  In  March  following  he 
notes :  "  Had  a  safe  and  comfortable  journey  to 
York."  But  April  24th,  we  find :  "  Shay  over- 
turned, with  my  wife  and  I  in  it,  yet  neither  of  us 
much  hurt.  Blessed  be  our  gracious  Preserver. 
Part  of  the  shay,  as  it  lay  upon  one  side,  went  over 
my  wife,  and  yet  she  was  scarcely  anything  hurt. 
How  wonderful  the  preservation."  Then  again, 
May  5th  t  "  Went  to  the  beach  with  three  of  the 
children.  The  beast,  being  frightened  when  we 
1  Rev.  Joseph  Emerson. 


EZRA  RIPLEY,  D.  D.  361 

were  all  out  of  the  shay,  overturned  and  broke  it. 
I  desire  (I  hope  I  desire  it)  that  the  Lord  would 
teach  me  suitably  to  repent  this  Providence,  to 
make  suitable  remarks  on  it,  and  to  be  suitably  af- 
fected with  it.  Have  I  done  well  to  get  me  a  shay  ? 
Have  I  not  been  proud  or  too  fond  of  this  conven- 
ience ?  Do  I  exercise  the  faith  in  the  Divine  care 
and  protection  which  I  ought  to  do  ?  Should  I 
not  be  more  in  my  study  and  less  fond  of  diver- 
sion? Do  I  not  withhold  more  than  is  meet  from 
pious  and  charitable  uses  ?  "  Well,  on  15th  May 
we  have  this  :  "  Shay  brought  home ;  mending  cost 
thirty  shillings.  Favored  in  this  respect  beyond 
expectation."  16th  May :  "  My  wife  and  I  rode 
together  to  Rumney  Marsh.  The  beast  frighted 
several  times."  And  at  last  we  have  this  record, 
June  4th:  "Disposed  of  my  shay  to  Rev.  Mr. 
White." 

The  same  faith  made  what  was  strong  and  what 
was  weak  in  Dr.  Ripley  and  his  associates.  He 
was  a  perfectly  sincere  man,  punctual,  severe,  but 
just  and  charitable,  and  if  he  made  his  forms  a 
strait-jacket  to  others,  he  wore  the  same  himself  all 
his  years.  Trained  in  this  church,  and  very  well 
qualified  by  his  natural  talent  to  work  in  it,  it  was 
never  out  of  his  mind.  He  looked  at  every  person 
and  thing  from  the  parochial  point  of  view.  I  re- 
member, when  a  boy,  driving  about  Concord  with 


362  EZRA  RIPLEY,  D.  D. 

him,  and  in  passing  each  house  he  told  the  story  of 
the  family  that  lived  in  it,  and  especially  he  gave 
me  anecdotes  of  the  nine  church  members  who  had 
made  a  division  in  the  church  in  the  time  of  his 
predecessor,  and  showed  me  how  every  one  of  the 
nine  had  come  to  bad  fortune  or  to  a  bad  end. 
His  prayers  for  rain  and  against  the  lightning, 
"  that  it  may  not  lick  up  our  spirits  ; "  and  for 
good  weather ;  and  against  sickness  and  insanity ; 
"  that  we  have  not  been  tossed  to  and  fro  until  the 
dawning  of  the  day,  that  we  have  not  been  a  terror 
to  ourselves  and  others  ; "  are  well  remembered, 
and  his  own  entire  faith  that  these  petitions  were 
not  to  be  overlooked,  and  were  entitled  to  a  favor- 
able answer.  Some  of  those  around  me  will  re- 
member one  occasion  of  severe  drought  in  this  vi- 
cinity, when  the  late  Rev.  Mr.  Goodwin  offered  to 
relieve  the  Doctor  of  the  duty  of  leading  in  prayer ; 
but  the  Doctor  suddenly  remembering  the  season, 
rejected  his  offer  with  some  humor,  as  with  an  air 
that  said  to  all  the  congregation,  "  This  is  no  time 
for  you  young  Cambridge  men ;  the  affair,  sir,  is 
getting  serious.  I  will  pray  myself."  One  August 
afternoon,  when  I  was  in  his  hayfield  helping  him 
with  his  man  to  rake  up  his  hay,  I  well  remember 
his  pleading,  almost  reproachful  looks  at  the  sky, 
when  the  thunder  gust  was  coming  up  to  spoil  his 
hay.    He  raked  very  fast,  then  looked  at  the  cloud, 


EZRA  RIPLEY,  D.  D.  363 

and  said,  "  We  are  in  the  Lord's  hand ;  mind  your 
rake,  George  !  We  are  in  the  Lord's  hand  ;  "  and 
seemed  to  say,  "  You  know  me  ;  this  field  is  mine, 
—  Dr.  Ripley's,  —  thine  own  servant !  " 

He  used  to  tell  the  story  of  one  of  his  old  friends, 
the  minister  of  Sudbury,  who,  being  at  the  Thurs- 
day lecture  in  Boston,  heard  the  officiating  clergy- 
man praying  for  rain.  As  soon  as  the  service  was 
over,  he  went  to  the  petitioner,  and  said,  "  You 
Boston  ministers,  as  soon  as  a  tulip  wilts  under 
your  windows,  go  to  church  and  pray  for  rain,  un- 
til all  Concord  and  Sudbury  are  under  water."  I 
once  rode  with  him  to  a  house  at  Nine  Acre  Cor- 
ner to  attend  the  funeral  of  the  father  of  a  family. 
He  mentioned  to  me  on  the  way  his  fears  that  the 
oldest  son,  who  was  now  to  succeed  to  the  farm, 
was  becoming  intemperate.  We  presently  arrived, 
and  the  Doctor  addressed  each  of  the  mourners  sep- 
arately :  "  Sir,  I  condole  with  you."  "  Madam,  I 
condole  with  you."  "  Sir,  I  knew  your  great-grand- 
father. When  I  came  to  this  town,  your  great- 
grandfather was  a  substantial  farmer  in  this  very 
place,  a  member  of  the  church,  and  an  excellent 
citizen.  Your  grandfather  followed  him,  and  was 
a  virtuous  man.  Now  your  father  is  to  be  carried 
to  his  grave,  full  of  labors  and  virtues.  There  is 
none  of  that  large  family  left  but  you,  and  it  rests 
with  you  to  bear  up  the  good  name  and  usefulness 


364  EZRA  RIPLEY,  D.  D. 

of  your  ancestors.  If  you  fail, — '  Ichabod,  the  glory 
is  departed.'  Let  us  pray."  Eight  manly  he  was, 
and  the  manly  thing  he  could  always  say.  I  can 
remember  a  little  speech  he  made  to  me,  when  the 
last  tie  of  blood  which  held  me  and  my  brothers  to 
his  house  was  broken  by  the  death  of  his  daughter. 
He  said,  on  parting,  "  I  wish  you  and  your  broth- 
ers to  come  to  this  house  as  you  have  always  done. 
You  will  not  like  to  be  excluded ;  I  shall  not  like 
to  be  neglected." 

When  "  Put "  Merriam,  after  his  release  from 
the  state  prison,  had  the  effrontery  to  call  on  the 
doctor  as  an  old  acquaintance,  in  the  midst  of  gen- 
eral conversation  Mr.  Frost  came  in,  and  the  doc- 
tor presently  said,  "  Mr.  Merriam,  my  brother  and 
colleague,  Mr.  Frost,  has  come  to  take  tea  with  me. 
I  regret  very  much  the  causes  (which  you  know 
very  well)  which  make  it  impossible  for  me  to  ask 
you  to  stay  and  break  bread  with  us."  With  the 
Doctor's  views  it  was  a  matter  of  religion  to  say 
thus  much.  He  had  a  reverence  and  love  of  soci- 
ety, and  the  patient,  continuing  courtesy,  carrying 
out  every  respectful  attention  to  the  end,  which 
marks  what  is  called  the  manners  of  the  old  school. 
His  hospitality  obeyed  Charles  Lamb's  rule,  and 
"  ran  fine  to  the  last."  His  partiality  for  ladies 
was  always  strong,  and  was  by  no  means  abated  by 
time.     He  claimed  privilege  of  years,  was  much  ad- 


EZRA  RIPLEY,  D.  D.  365 

dieted  to  kissing ;  spared  neither  maid,  wife,  nor 
widow,  and,  as  a  lady  thus  favored  remarked  to 
me,  "  seemed  as  if  he  was  going  to  make  a  meal  of 

you." 

He  was  very  credulous,  and  as  he  was  no  reader 
of  books  or  journals,  he  knew  nothing  beyond  the 
columns  of  his  weekly  religious  newspaper,  the 
tracts  of  his  sect,  and  perhaps  the  Middlesex  Yeo- 
man. He  was  the  easy  dupe  of  any  tonguey  agent, 
whether  colonizationist  or  anti-papist,  or  charlatan 
of  iron  combs,  or  tractors,  or  phrenology,  or  mag- 
netism, who  went  by.  At  the  time  when  Jack 
Downing' s  letters  were  in  every  paper,  he  repeated 
to  me  at  table  some  of  the  particulars  of  that  gen- 
tleman's intimacy  with  General  Jackson,  in  a  man- 
ner that  betrayed  to  me  at  once  that  he  took  the 
whole  for  fact.  To  undeceive  him,  I  hastened  to 
recall  some  particulars  to  show  the  absurdity  of  the 
thing,  as  the  Major  and  the  President  going  out 
skating  on  the  Potomac,  etc.  "  Why, "  said  the 
Doctor  with  perfect  faith,  "  it  was  a  bright  moon- 
light night ; "  and  I  am  not  sure  that  he  did  not 
die  in  the  belief  in  the  reality  of  Major  Downing. 
Like  other  credulous  men,  he  was  opinionative, 
and,  as  I  well  remember,  a  great  browbeater  of 
the  poor  old  fathers  who  still  survived  from  the 
19th  of  April,  to  the  end  that  they  should  testify  to 
his  history  as  he  had  written  it. 


366  EZRA  RIPLEY,  D.  D. 

He  was  a  man  so  kind  and  sympathetic,  his  char- 
acter was  so  transparent,  and  his  merits  so  intelli- 
gible to  all  observers,  that  he  was  very  justly  ap- 
preciated in  this  community.  He  was  a  natural 
gentleman,  no  dandy,  but  courtly,  hospitable,  manly 
and  public  -  spirited  ;  his  nature  social,  his  house 
open  to  all  men.  We  remember  the  remark  made 
by  the  old  farmer  who  used  to  travel  hither  from 
Maine,  that  no  horse  from  the  Eastern  country 
would  go  by  the  doctor's  gate.  Travellers  from 
the  West  and  North  and  South  bear  the  like  testi- 
mony. His  brow  was  serene  and  open  to  his  vis- 
itor, for  he  loved  men,  and  he  had  no  studies,  no 
occupations,  which  company  could  interrupt.  His 
friends  were  his  study,  and  to  see  them  loosened 
his  talents  and  his  tongue.  In  his  house  dwelt  or- 
der and  prudence  and  plenty.  There  was  no  waste 
and  no  stint.  He  was  open-handed  and  just  and 
generous.  Ingratitude  and  meanness  in  his  benefi- 
ciaries did  not  wear  out  his  compassion ;  he  bore 
the  insult,  and  the  next  day  his  basket  for  the  beg- 
gar, his  horse  and  chaise  for  the  cripple,  were  at 
their  door.  Though  he  knew  the  value  of  a  dollar 
as  well  as  another  man,  yet  he  loved  to  buy  dearer 
and  sell  cheaper  than  others.  He  subscribed  to  all 
charities,  and  it  is  no  reflection  on  others  to  say 
that  he  was  the  most  public-spirited  man  in  the 
town.     The  late  Dr.  Gardiner,  in  a  funeral  sermon 


EZRA  RIPLEY,  D.  D.  367 

on  some  parishioner  whose  virtues  did  not  readily 
come  to  mind,  honestly  said,  "  He  was  good  at 
fires."  Dr.  Ripley  had  many  virtues,  and  yet  all 
will  remember  that  even  in  his  old  age,  if  the  fire- 
bell  was  rung,  he  was  instantly  on  horseback  with 
his  buckets  and  bag. 

He  showed  even  in  his  fireside  discourse  traits  of 
that  pertinency  and  judgment,  softening  ever  and 
anon  into  elegancy,  which  make  the  distinction  of 
the  scholar,  and  which,  under  better  discipline, 
might  have  ripened  into  a  Bentley  or  a  Porson.  He 
had  a  foresight,  when  he  opened  his  mouth,  of  all 
that  he  would  say,  and  he  marched  straight  to  the 
conclusion.  In  debate  in  the  vestry  of  the  Lyceum, 
the  structure  of  his  sentences  was  admirable;  so 
neat,  so  natural,  so  terse,  his  words  fell  like  stones ; 
and  often,  though  quite  unconscious  of  it,  his  speech 
was  a  satire  on  the  loose,  voluminous,  draggle-tail 
periods  of  other  speakers.  He  sat  down  when  he 
had  done.  A  man  of  anecdote,  his  talk  in  the 
parlor  was  chiefly  narrative.  We  remember  the 
remark  of  a  gentleman  who  listened  with  much  de- 
light to  his  conversation  at  the  time  when  the  Doc- 
tor was  preparing  to  go  to  Baltimore  and  Wash- 
ington, that  "  a  man  who  could  tell  a  story  so  well 
was  company  for  kings  and  John  Quincy  Adams." 

Sage  and  savage  strove  harder  in  him  than  in 
any  of  my  acquaintances,  each  getting  the  mastery 


368  EZRA  RIPLEY,  D.  D. 

by  turns,  and  pretty  sudden  turns  :  "  Save  us  from 
the  extremity  of  cold  and  these  violent  sudden 
changes."  "  The  society  will  meet  after  the  Ly- 
ceum, as  it  is  difficult  to  bring  people  together  in 
the  evening,  —  and  no  moon."  "  Mr.  N.  F.  is 
dead,  and  I  expect  to  hear  of  the  death  of  Mr.  B. 
It  is  cruel  to  separate  old  people  from  their  wives 
in  this  cold  weather." 

With  a  very  limited  acquaintance  with  books, 
his  knowledge  was  an  external  experience,  an  In- 
dian wisdom,  the  observation  of  such  facts  as  coun- 
try life  for  nearly  a  century  could  supply.  He 
watched  with  interest  the  garden,  the  field,  the  or- 
chard, the  house  and  the  barn,  horse,  cow,  sheep 
and  dog,  and  all  the  common  objects  that  engage 
the  thought  of  the  farmer.  He  kept  his  eye  on  the 
horizon,  and  knew  the  weather  like  a  sea-captain. 
The  usual  experiences  of  men,  birth,  marriage,  sick- 
ness, death,  burial ;  the  common  temptations ;  the 
common  ambitions ;  —  he  studied  them  all,  and 
sympathized  so  well  in  these  that  he  was  excellent 
company  and  counsel  to  all,  even  the  most  humble 
and  ignorant.  With  extraordinary  states  of  mind, 
with  states  of  enthusiasm  or  enlarged  speculation, 
he  had  no  sympathy,  and  pretended  to  none.  He 
was  sincere,  and  kept  to  his  point,  and  his  mark 
was  never  remote.  His  conversation  was  strictly 
personal  and  apt  to  the  party  and  the  occasion. 


EZRA  RIPLEY,  D.  D.  369 

An  eminent  skill  he  had  in  saying  difficult  and 
unspeakable  things  ;  in  delivering  to  a  man  or  a 
woman  that  which  all  their  other  friends  had  ab- 
stained from  saying,  in  uncovering  the  bandage 
from  a  sore  place,  and  applying  the  surgeon's  knife 
with  a  truly  surgical  spirit.  Was  a  man  a  sot,  or 
a  spendthrift,  or  too  long  time  a  bachelor,  or  sus- 
pected of  some  hidden  crime,  or  had  he  quarrelled 
with  his  wife,  or  collared  his  father,  or  was  there 
any  cloud  or  suspicious  circumstances  in  his  behav- 
ior, the  good  pastor  knew  his  way  straight  to  that 
point,  believing  himself  entitled  to  a  full  explana- 
tion, and  whatever  relief  to  the  conscience  of  both 
parties  plain  speech  could  effect  was  sure  to  be  pro- 
cured. In  all  such  passages  he  justified  himself  to 
the  conscience,  and  commonly  to  the  love,  of  the 
persons  concerned.  He  was  the  more  competent 
to  these  searching  discourses  from  his  knowledge 
of  family  history.  He  knew  everybody's  grand- 
father, and  seemed  to  address  each  person  rather 
as  the  representative  of  his  house  and  name,  than 
as  an  individual.  In  him  have  perished  more  local 
and  personal  anecdotes  of  this  village  and  vicinity 
than  are  possessed  by  any  survivor.  This  intimate 
knowledge  of  families,  and  this  skill  of  speech,  and 
still  more,  his  sympathy,  made  him  incomparable 
in  his  parochial  visits,  and  in  his  exhortations  and 
prayers.     He  gave  himself  up  to  his  feelings^  and 

vol.  x.  24 


370  EZRA  RIPLEY,  D.  D. 

said  on  the  instant  the  best  things  in  the  world 
Many  and  many  a  felicity  he  had  in  his  prayer, 
now  forever  lost,  which  defied  all  the  rules  of  all 
the  rhetoricians.  He  did  not  know  when  he  was 
good  in  prayer  or  sermon,  for  he  had  no  literature 
and  no  art ;  but  he  believed,  and  therefore  spoke. 
He  was  eminently  loyal  in  his  nature,  and  not  fond 
of  adventure  or  innovation.  By  education,  and  still 
more  by  temperament,  he  was  engaged  to  the  old 
forms  of  the  New  England  Church.  Not  specula- 
tive, but  affectionate;  devout,  but  with  an  extreme 
love  of  order,  he  adopted  heartily,  though  in  its 
mildest  form,  the  creed  and  catechism  of  the  fa- 
thers, and  appeared  a  modern  Israelite  in  his  attach- 
ment to  the  Hebrew  history  and  faith.  He  was  a 
man  very  easy  to  read,  for  his  whole  life  and  con- 
versation were  consistent.  All  his  opinions  and 
actions  might  be  securely  predicted  by  a  good  ob- 
server on  short  acquaintance.  My  classmate  at 
Cambridge,  Frederick  King,  told  me  from  Gov- 
ernor Gore,  who  was  the  Doctor's  classmate,  that 
in  college  he  was  called  Holy  Ripley. 

And  now,  in  his  old  age,  when  all  the  antique 
Hebraism  and  its  customs  are  passing  away,  it  is 
fit  that  he  too  should  depart,  —  most  fit  that  in  the 
fall  of  laws  a  loyal  man  should  die. 


MARY   MOODY   EMERSON. 


The  yesterday  doth  never  smile, 

To-day  goes  drudging  through  the  while, 

Yet  in  the  name  of  Godhead,  I 

The  morrow  front  and  can  defy  ; 

Though  I  am  weak,  yet  God,  when  prayed, 

Cannot  withhold  his  conquering  aid. 

Ah  me  !  it  was  my  childhood's  thought, 

If  He  should  make  my  web  a  blot 

On  life's  fair  picture  of  delight, 

My  heart's  content  would  find  it  right. 

But  O,  these  waves  and  leaves,  — 

When  happy,  stoic  Nature  grieves,  — 

No  human  speech  so  beautiful 

As  their  murmurs  mine  to  lull. 

On  this  altar  God  hath  built 

I  lay  my  vanity  and  guilt; 

Nor  me  can  Hope  or  Passion  urge, 

Hearing  as  now  the  lofty  dirge 

Which  blasts  of  Northern  mountains  hyni% 

Nature's  funeral  high  and  dim,  — 

Sable  pageantry  of  clouds, 

Mourning  summer  laid  in  shrouds. 

Many  a  day  shall  dawn  and  die, 

Many  an  angel  wander  by, 

And  passing,  light  my  sunken  turf, 

Mcist  perhaps  by  ocean  surf, 

Forgotten  amid  splendid  tombs, 

Yet  wreathed  and  hid  by  summer  blooms. 

On  earth  I  dream;  —  I  die  to  be: 

Time!  shake  not  thy  bald  head  at  me. 

I  challenge  thee  to  hurry  past, 

Or  for  my  turn  to  fly  too  fast. 


[Lucy  Percy,  Countess  of  Carlisle,  the  friend  of  Strafford 
and  of  Pym,  is  thus  described  by  Sir  Toby  Matthews:  ] 

"  She  is  of  too  high  a  mind  and  dignity  not  only  to  seek, 
but  almost  to  wish,  the  friendship  of  any  creature.  They 
whom  she  is  pleased  to  choose  are  such  as  are  of  the  most 
eminent  condition  both  for  power  and  employment,  —  not  with 
any  design  towards  her  own  particular,  either  of  advantage 
or  curiosity,  but  her  nature  values  fortunate  persons.  She 
prefers  the  conversation  of  men  to  that  of  women;  not  but 
she  can  talk  on  the  fashions  with  her  female  friends,  but  she 
is  too  soon  sensible  that  she  can  set  them  as  she  wills;  that 
pre-eminence  shortens  all  equality.  She  converses  with  those 
who  are  most  distinguished  for  their  conversational  powers. 
Of  Love  freely  will  she  discourse,  listen  to  all  its  faults  and 
mark  its  power:  and  will  take  h  deep  interest  for  persons  of 
celebrity." 


MAEY  MOODY  EMERSON; 


I  wish  to  meet  the  invitation  with  which  the  la- 
dies have  honored  me  by  offering  them  a  portrait 
of  real  life.  It  is  a  representative  life,  such  as  could 
hardly  have  appeared  out  of  New  England ;  of  an 
age  now  past,  and  of  which  I  think  no  types  sur- 
vive. Perhaps  I  deceive  myself  and  overestimate 
its  interest.  It  has  to  me  a  value  like  that  which 
many  readers  find  in  Madame  Guyon,  in  Rahel,  in 
Eugenie  de  Guerin,  but  it  is  purely  original  and 
hardly  admits  of  a  duplicate.  Then  it  is  a  fruit  of 
Calvinism  and  New  England,  and  marks  the  pre- 
cise time  when  the  power  of  the  old  creed  yielded 
to  the  influence  of  modern  science  and  humanity. 

I  have  found  that  I  could  only  bring  you  this 
portrait  by  selections  from  the  diary  of  my  heroine, 

1  Aunt  of  Mr.  Emerson,  and  a  potent  influence  on  the  lives 
of  him  and  his  brothers.  This  paper  was  read  before  the 
"Woman's  Club,"  in  Boston,  in  1869,  under  the  title 
u  Amita,"  which  was  also  the  original  superscription  of  the 
"  Nun's  Aspiration,"  in  his  Poems ;  a  rendering  into  verse  of 
a  passage  in  Miss  Emerson's  diary.  Part  of  this  poem  forms 
the  motto  of  this  chapter. 


374  MARY  MOODY  EMERSON. 

premising  a  sketch  of  her  time  and  place.  I  report 
some  of  the  thoughts  and  soliloquies  of  a  country 
girl,  poor,  solitary,  —  '  a  goody  '  as  she  called  her- 
self, —  growing  from  youth  to  age  amid  slender 
opportunities  and  usually  very  humble  company. 

Mary  Moody  Emerson  was  born  just  before  the 
outbreak  of  the  Revolution.  When  introduced  to 
Lafayette  at  Portland,  she  told  him  that  she  was 
"in  arms"  at  the  Concord  Fight.  Her  father, 
the  minister  of  Concord,  a  warm  patriot  in  1775, 
went  as  a  chaplain  to  the  American  army  at  Ticon- 
deroga :  he  carried  his  infant  daughter,  before  he 
went,  to  his  mother  in  Maiden  and  told  her  to  keep 
the  child  until  he  returned.  He  died  at  Rutland, 
Vermont,  of  army-fever,  the  next  year,  and  Mary 
remained  at  Maiden  with  her  grandmother,  and, 
after  her  death,  with  her  father's  sister,  in  whose 
house  she  grew  up,  rarely  seeing  her  brothers  and 
sisters  in  Concord.  This  aunt  and  her  husband 
lived  on  a  farm,  were  getting  old,  and  the  husband 
a  shiftless,  easy  man.  There  was  plenty  of  work 
for  the  little  niece  to  do  day  by  day,  and  not  always 
bread  enough  in  the  house. 

One  of  her  tasks,  it  appears,  was  to  watch  for  the 
approach  of  the  deputy-sheriff,  who  might  come  to 
confiscate  the  spoons  or  arrest  the  uncle  for  debt. 
Later,  another  aunt,  who  had  become  insane,  was 
brought  hither  to  end  her  days.     More  and  sadder 


MARY  MOODY  EMERSON.  375 

work  for  this  young  girl.  She  had  no  companions, 
lived  in  entire  solitude  with  these  old  people,  very 
rarely  cheered  by  short  visits  from  her  brothers  and 
sisters.  Her  mother  had  married  again,  —  mar- 
ried the  minister  who  succeeded  her  husband  in  the 
parish  at  Concord,  [Dr.  Ezra  Ripley,]  and  had 
now  a  young  family  growing  up  around  her. 

Her  aunt  became  strongly  attached  to  Mary,  and 
persuaded  the  family  to  give  the  child  up  to  her 
as  a  daughter,  on  some  terms  embracing  a  care  of 
her  future  interests.  She  would  leave  the  farm  to 
her  by  will.  This  promise  was  kept ;  she  came  into 
possession  of  the  property  many  years  after,  and 
her  dealings  with  it  gave  her  no  small  trouble, 
though  they  give  much  piquancy  to  her  letters  in 
after  years.  Finally  it  was  sold,  and  its  price  in- 
vested in  a  share  of  a  farm  in  Maine,  where  she 
lived  as  a  boarder  with  her  sister,  for  many  years. 
It  was  in  a  picturesque  country,  within  sight  of  the 
White  Mountains,  with  a  little  lake  in  front  at  the 
foot  of  a  high  hill  called  Bear  Mountain.  Not  far 
from  the  house  was  a  brook  running  over  a  granite 
floor  like  the  Franconia  Flume,  and  noble  forests 
around.  Every  word  she  writes  about  this  farm 
("  Elm  Yale,"  Waterford,)  her  dealings  and  vexa- 
tions about  it,  her  joys  and  raptures  of  religion  and 
Nature,  interest  like  a  romance,  and  to  those  who 
may  hereafter  read  her  letters,  will  make  its  ob- 
scure acres  amiable. 


376  MARY  MOODY  EMERSON. 

In  Maiden  she  lived  through  all  her  youth  and 
early  womanhood,  with  the  habit  of  visiting  the 
families  of  her  brothers  and  sisters  on  any  neces- 
sity of  theirs.  Her  good  will  to  serve  in  time  of 
sickness  or  of  pressure  was  known  to  them,  and 
promptly  claimed,  and  her  attachment  to  the  youths 
and  maidens  growing  up  in  those  families  was  se- 
cure for  any  trait  of  talent  or  of  character.  Her 
sympathy  for  young  people  who  pleased  her  was 
almost  passionate,  and  was  sure  to  make  her  ar- 
rival in  each  house  a  holiday. 

Her  early  reading  was  Milton,  Young,  Akenside, 
Samuel  Clarke,  Jonathan  Edwards,  and  always  the 
Bible.  Later,  Plato,  Plotinus,  Marcus  Antoninus, 
Stewart,  Coleridge,  Cousin,  Herder,  Locke,  Ma- 
dame De  Stael,  Channing,  Mackintosh,  Byron.  No- 
body can  read  in  her  manuscript,  or  recall  the  con- 
versation of  old-school  people,  without  seeing  that 
Milton  and  Young  had  a  religious  authority  in  their 
mind,  and  nowise  the  slight,  merely  entertaining 
quality  of  modern  bards.  And  Plato,  Aristotle, 
Plotinus, —  how  venerable  and  organic  as  Nature 
they  are  in  her  mind !  What  a  subject  is  her 
mind  and  life  for  the  finest  novel !  When  I  read 
Dante,  the  other  day,  and  his  paraphrases  to  sig- 
nify with  more  adequateness  Christ  or  Jehovah, 
whom  do  you  think  I  was  reminded  of  ?  Whom 
but   Mary  Emerson  and  her  eloquent  theology? 


MARY  MOODY  EMERSON.  377 

She  had  a  deep  sympathy  with  genius.  When  it 
was  unhallowed,  as  in  Byron,  she  had  none  the 
less,  whilst  she  deplored  and  affected  to  denounce 
him.  But  she  adored  it  when  ennobled  by  charac- 
ter. She  liked  to  notice  that  the  greatest  geniuses 
have  died  ignorant  of  their  power  and  influence. 
She  wished  you  to  scorn  to  shine.  "  My  opinion," 
she  writes,  (is)  "  that  a  mind  like  Byron's  would 
never  be  satisfied  with  modern  Unitarianism,  — 
that  the  fiery  depths  of  Calvinism,  its  high  and 
mysterious  elections  to  eternal  bliss,  beyond  angels, 
and  all  its  attendant  wonders  would  have  alone 
been  fitted  to  fix  his  imagination." 

Her  wit  was  so  fertile,  and  only  used  to  strike, 
that  she  never  used  it  for  display,  any  more  than 
a  wasp  would  parade  his  sting.  It  was  ever  the 
will  and  not  the  phrase  that  concerned  her.  Yet 
certain  expressions,  when  they  marked  a  memora- 
ble state  of  mind  in  her  experience,  recurred  to 
her  afterwards,  and  she  would  vindicate  herself  as 

having  said  to  Dr.  R or  Uncle  L so  and 

so,  at  such  a  period  of  her  life.  But  they  were  in- 
tensely true  when  first  spoken.  All  her  language 
was  happy,  but  inimitable,  unattainable  by  talent, 
as  if  caught  from  some  dream.  She  calls  herself 
"  the  puny  pilgrim,  whose  sole  talent  is  sympathy." 
"  I  like  that  kind  of  apathy  that  is  a  triumph  to 
overset." 


B78  MARY  MOODY  EMERSON. 

She  writes  to  her  nephew  Charles  Emerson,  in 
1833  :  —  "I  could  never  have  adorned  the  garden. 
If  I  had  been  in  aught  but  dreary  deserts,  I  should 
have  idolized  my  friends,  despised  the  world  and 
been  haughty.  I  never  expected  connections  and 
matrimony.  My  taste  was  formed  in  romance,  and 
I  knew  I  was  not  destined  to  please.  I  love  God 
and  his  creation  as  I  never  else  could.  I  scarcely 
feel  the  sympathies  of  this  life  enough  to  agitate 
the  pool.  This  in  general,  one  case  or  so  excepted, 
and  even  this  is  a  relation  to  God  through  you. 
'T  was  so  in  my  happiest  early  days,  when  you  were 
at  my  side." 

Destitution  is  the  Muse  of  her  genius,  —  Destitu- 
tion and  Death.  I  used  to  propose  that  her  epi- 
taph should  be :  "  Here  lies  the  angel  of  Death." 
And  wonderfully  as  she  varies  and  poetically  re- 
peats that  image  in  every  page  and  day,  yet  not 
less  fondly  and  sublimely  she  returns  to  the  other, 
—  the  grandeur  of  humility  and  privation,  as  thus ; 
"  The  chief  witness  which  I  have  had  of  a  Godlike 
principle  of  action  and  feeling  is  in  the  disinter- 
ested joy  felt  in  others'  superiority.  For  the  love 
of  superior  virtue  is  mine  own  gift  from  God." 
"  Where  were  thine  own  intellect  if  others  had  not 
lived?" 

She  had  many  acquaintances  among  the  notables 
of  the  time ;  and  now  and  then  in  her  migrations 


MARY  MOODY  EMERSON.  379 

from  town  to  town  in  Maine  and  Massachusetts,  in 
search  of  a  new  boarding-place,  discovered  some 
preacher  with  sense  or  piety,  or  both.  For  on  her 
arrival  at  any  new  home  she  was  likely  to  steer 
first  to  the  minister's  house  and  pray  his  wife  to 
take  a  boarder ;  and  as  the  minister  found  quickly 
that  she  knew  all  his  books  and  many  more,  and 
made  shrewd  guesses  at  his  character  and  possibili- 
ties, she  would  easily  rouse  his  curiosity,  as  a  per- 
son who  could  read  his  secret  and  tell  him  his  for- 
tune. 

She  delighted  in  success,  in  youth,  in  beauty,  in 
genius,  in  manners.  When  she  met  a  young  per- 
son who  interested  her,  she  made  herself  acquainted 
and  intimate  with  him  or  her  at  once,  by  sympathy, 
by  flattery,  by  raillery,  by  anecdotes,  by  wit,  by  re- 
buke, and  stormed  the  castle.  None  but  was  at- 
tracted or  piqued  by  her  interest  and  wit  and  wide 
acquaintance  with  books  and  with  eminent  names. 
She  said  she  gave  herself  full  swing  in  these  sud- 
den intimacies,  for  she  knew  she  should  disgust  them 
soon,  and  resolved  to  have  their  best  hours.  "  So- 
ciety is  shrewd  to  detect  those  who  do  not  belong 
to  her  train,  and  seldom  wastes  her  attentions." 
She  surprised,  attracted,  chided  and  denounced  her 
companion  by  turns,  and  pretty  rapid  turns.  But 
no  intelligent  youth  or  maiden  could  have  once  met 
her  without  remembering  her  with  interest,  and 


380  MARY  MOODY  EMERSON. 

learning  something  of  value.  Scorn  trifles,  lift 
your  aims :  do  what  you  are  afraid  to  do :  sublim- 
ity of  character  must  come  from  sublimity  of  mo- 
tive :  these  were  the  lessons  which  were  urged  with 
vivacity,  in  ever  new  language.  But  if  her  com- 
panion was  dull,  her  impatience  knew  no  bounds. 
She  tired  presently  of  dull  conversations,  and  asked 
to  be  read  to,  and  so  disposed  of  the  visitor.  If 
the  voice  or  the  reading  tired  her,  she  would  ask 
the  friend  if  he  or  she  would  do  an  errand  for  her, 
and  so  dismiss  them.  If  her  companion  were  a 
little  ambitious,  and  asked  her  opinions  on  books 
or  matters  on  which  she  did  not  wish  rude  hands 
laid,  she  did  not  hesitate  to  stop  the  intruder  with 
''How's  your  cat,  Mrs.  Tenner?'' 

"I  was  disappointed,"  she  writes,  "in  finding 
my  little  Calvinist  no  companion,  a  cold  little  thing 
who  lives  in  society  alone,  and  is  looked  up  to  as  a 
specimen  of  genius.  I  performed  a  mission  in  se- 
cretly undermining  his  vanity,  or  trying  to.  Alas  ! 
never  done  but  by  mortifying  affliction."  From  the 
country  she  writes  to  her  sister  in  town,  "  You  can- 
not help  saying  that  my  epistle  is  a  striking  speci- 
men of  egotism.  To  which  I  can  only  answer  that, 
in  the  country,  we  converse  so  much  more  with 
ourselves,  that  we  are  almost  led  to  forget  every- 
body else.  The  very  sound  of  your  bells  and  the 
rattling  of  the  carriages  have  a  tendency  to  divert 


MARY  MOODY  EMERSON.  381 

selfishness.''  "  This  seems  a  world  rather  of  trying 
each  others'  dispositions  than  of  enjoying  each 
others'  virtues." 

She  had  the  misfortune  of  spinning  with  a  greater 
velocity  than  any  of  the  other  tops.  She  would 
tear  into  the  chaise  or  out  of  it,  into  the  house  or 
out  of  it,  into  the  conversation,  into  the  thought, 
into  the  character  of  the  stranger,  —  disdaining  all 
the  graduation  by  which  her  fellows  time  their 
steps  :  and  though  she  might  do  very  happily  in  a 
planet  where  others  moved  with  the  like  velocity, 
she  was  offended  here  by  the  phlegm  of  all  her  fel- 
low-creatures, and  disgusted  them  by  her  impatience. 
She  could  keep  step  with  no  human  being.  Her 
nephew  [R.  W.  E.]  wrote  of  her :  "lam  glad  the 
friendship  with  Aunt  Mary  is  ripening.  As  by 
seeing  a  high  tragedy,  reading  a  true  poem,  or  a 
novel  like  '  Corinne,'  so,  by  society  with  her,  one's 
mind  is  electrified  and  purged.  She  is  no  statute- 
book  of  practical  commandments,  nor  orderly  di- 
gest of  any  system  of  philosophy,  divine  or  human, 
but  a  Bible,  miscellaneous  in  its  parts,  but  one  in 
its  spirit,  wherein  are  sentences  of  condemnation, 
promises  and  covenants  of  love  that  make  foolish 
the  wisdom  of  the  world  with  the  power  of  God." 

Our  Delphian  was  fantastic  enough,  Heaven 
knows,  yet  could  always  be  tamed  by  large  and 
sincere  conversation.     Was  there  thought  and  elo- 


382  MARY  MOODY  EMERSON. 

quence,  she  would  listen  like  a  child.  Her  aspira- 
tion and  prayer  would  begin,  and  the  whim  and 
petulance  in  which  by  diseased  habit  she  had  grown 
to  indulge  without  suspecting  it,  was  burned  up  in 
the  glow  of  her  pure  and  poetic  spirit,  which  dearly 
loved  the  Infinite. 

She  writes :  "  August,  1847  :  Yale.  —  My  oddi- 
ties were  never  designed  —  effect  of  an  uncalcula- 
ting  constitution,  at  first,  then  through  isolation ; 
and  as  to  dress,  from  duty.  To  be  singular  of 
choice,  without  singular  talents  and  virtues,  is  as 
ridiculous  as  ungrateful."  "  It  is  so  universal  with 
all  classes  to  avoid  contact  with  me  that  I  blame 
none.  The  fact  has  generally  increased  piety  and 
self-love."  "  As  a  traveller  enters  some  fine  palace 
and  finds  all  the  doors  closed,  and  he  only  allowed 
the  use  of  some  avenues  and  passages,  so  have  I 
wandered  from  the  cradle  over  the  apartments  of 
social  affections,  or  the  cabinets  of  natural  or  moral 
philosophy,  the  recesses  of  ancient  and  modern 
lore.  All  say  —  Forbear  to  enter  the  pales  of  the 
initiated  by  birth,  wealth,  talents  and  patronage. 
I  submit  with  delight,  for  it  is  the  echo  of  a  decree 
from  above ;  and  from  the  highway  hedges  where 
I  get  lodging,  and  from  the  rays  which  burst  forth 
when  the  crowd  are  entering  these  noble  saloons, 
whilst  I  stand  in  the  doors,  I  get  a  pleasing  vision 
which  is  an  earnest  of  the  interminable  skies  where 
the  mansions  are  prepared  for  the  poor." 


MARY  MOODY  EMERSON.  383 

"  To  live  to  give  pain  rather  than  pleasure  (the 
latter  so  delicious)  seems  the  spider-like  necessity 
of  my  being  on  earth,  and  I  have  gone  on  my  queer 
way  with  joy,  saying,  "  Shall  the  clay  interrogate?" 
But  in  every  actual  case,  'tis  hard,  and  we  lose 
sight  of  the  first  necessity,  —  here  too  amid  works 
red  with  default  in  all  great  and  grand  and  infinite 
aims.  Yet  with  intentions  disinterested,  though 
uncontrolled  by  proper  reverence  for  others." 

When  Mrs.  Thoreau  called  on  her  one  day, 
wearing  pink  ribbons,  she  shut  her  eyes,  and  so 
conversed  with  her  for  a  time.  By  and  by  she 
said,  "  Mrs.  Thoreau,  I  don't  know  whether  you 
have  observed  that  my  eyes  are  shut."  "Yes, 
Madam,  I  have  observed  it."  "  Perhaps  you  would 
like  to  know  the  reasons  ?  "  "  Yes,  I  should."  "  I 
don't  like  to  see  a  person  of  your  age  guilty  of  such 
levity  in  her  dress." 

When  her  cherished  favorite,  E.  H.,  was  at  the 
Vale,  and  had  gone  out  to  walk  in  the  forest  with 
Hannah,  her  niece,  Aunt  Mary  feared  they  were 
lost,  and  found  a  man  in  the  next  house  and  begged 
him  to  go  and  look  for  them.  The  man  went  and 
returned  saying  that  he  could  not  find  them.  "  Go 
and  cry,  '  Elizabeth ! '  "  The  man  rather  declined 
this  service,  as  he  did  not  know  Miss  H.  She  was 
highly  offended,  and  exclaimed,  "God  has  given 
you  a  voice  that  you  might  use  it  in  the  service  of 


384  MARY  MOODY  EMERSON. 

your  fellow-creatures.  Go  instantly  and  call  ;  Eliza- 
beth '  till  you  find  them."  The  man  went  immedi- 
ately, and  did  as  he  was  bid,  and  having  found 
them  apologized  for  calling  thus,  by  telling  what 
Miss  Emerson  had  said  to  him. 

When  some  ladies  of  my  acquaintance  by  an 
unusual  chance  found  themselves  in  her  neighbor- 
hood and  visited  her,  I  told  them  that  she  was  no 
whistle  that  every  mouth  could  play  on,  but  a  quite 
clannish  instrument,  a  pibroch,  for  example,  from 
which  none  but  a  native  Highlander  could  draw 
music. 

In  her  solitude  of  twenty  years,  with  fewest  books 
and  those  only  sermons,  and  a  copy  of  "  Paradise 
Lost,"  without  covers  or  title-page,  so  that  later, 
when  she  heard  much  of  Milton  and  sought  his 
work,  she  found  it  was  her  very  book  which  she 
knew  so  well,  —  she  was  driven  to  find  Nature  her 
companion  and  solace.  She  speaks  of  "  her  at- 
tempts in  Maiden,  to  wake  up  the  soul  amid  the 
dreary  scenes  of  monotonous  Sabbaths,  when  Na- 
ture looked  like  a  pulpit." 

"  Maiden,  November  15th,  1805.  —  What  a  rich 
day,  so  fully  occupied  in  pursuing  truth  that  I 
scorned  to  touch  a  novel  which  for  so  many  years 
I  have  wanted.     How  insipid  is  fiction  to  a  mind 

touched  with  immortal  views  !     November  16th.  — ■ 

■ 

I  am  so  small  in  my  expectations,  that  a  week  of 


MARY  MOODY  EMERSON.  385 

industry  delights.  Rose  before  light  every  morn  ; 
visited  from  necessity  once,  and  again  for  books  ; 
read  Butler's  Analogy ;  commented  on  the  Scrip- 
tures ;  read  in  a  little  book,  —  Cicero's  Letters,  — 
a  few  :  touched  Shakspeare,  —  washed,  carded, 
cleaned  house,  and  baked.  To-day  cannot  recall 
an  error,  nor  scarcely  a  sacrifice,  but  more  fulness 
of  content  in  the  labors  of  a  day  never  was  felt. 
There  is  a  sweet  pleasure  in  bending  to  circum- 
stances while  superior  to  them. 

"  Maiden,  September,  1807.  —  The  rapture  of 
feeling  I  would  part  from,  for  days  more  devoted 
to  higher  discipline.  But  when  Nature  beams  with 
such  excess  of  beauty,  when  the  heart  thrills  with 
hope  in  its  Author,  —  feels  that  it  is  related  to  him 
more  than  by  any  ties  of  Creation,  —  it  exults,  too 
fondly  perhaps  for  a  state  of  trial.  But  in  dead  of 
night,  nearer  morning,  when  the  eastern  stars  glow 
or  appear  to  glow  with  more  indescribable  lustre, 
a  lustre  which  penetrates  the  spirit  with  wonder 
and  curiosity,  —  then,  however  awed,  who  can  fear? 

Since  Sabbath,  Aunt  B [the  insane  aunt]  was 

brought  here.  Ah !  mortifying  sight !  instinct  per- 
haps triumphs  over  reason,  and  every  dignified  re- 
spect to  herself,  in  her  anxiety  about  recovery,  and 
the  smallest  means  connected.  Not  one  wish  of 
others  detains  her,  not  one  care.  But  it  alarms  me 
not,  I  shall  delight  to  return  to  God.     His  name 

vol.  x.  25 


386  MARY  MOODY  EMERSON. 

my  fullest  confidence.  His  sole  presence  ineffable 
pleasure. 

"  I  walked  yesterday  five  or  more  miles,  lost  to 
mental  or  heart  existence,  through  fatigue,  —  just 
fit  for  the  society  I  went  into,  all  mildness  and  the 
most  commonplace  virtue.  The  lady  is  celebrated 
for  her  cleverness,  and  she  was  never  so  good  to 
me.  Met  a  lady  in  the  morning  walk,  a  foreigner, 
—  conversed  on  the  accomplishments  of  Miss  T. 
My  mind  expanded  with  novel  and  innocent  pleas- 
ure. Ah !  were  virtue,  and  that  of  dear  heavenly 
meekness  attached  by  any  necessity  to  a  lower  rank 
of  genteel  people,  who, would  sympathize  with  the 
exalted  with  satisfaction  ?  But  that  is  not  the  case, 
I  believe.  A  mediocrity  does  seem  to  me  more 
distant  from  eminent  virtue  than  the  extremes  of 
station ;  though  after  all  it  must  depend  on  the  na- 
ture of  the  heart.  A  mediocre  mind  will  be  de- 
ranged in  either  extreme  of  wealth  or  poverty,  praise 
or  censure,  society  or  solitude.  The  feverish  lust  of 
notice  perhaps  in  all  these  cases  would  injure  the 
heart  of  common  refinement  and  virtue." 

Later  she  writes  of  her  early  days  in  Maiden : 
"  When  I  get  a  glimpse  of  the  revolutions  of  na- 
tions —  that  retribution  which  seems  forever  going 
on  in  this  part  of  creation,  —  I  remember  with  great 
satisfaction  that  from  all  the  ills  suffered,  in  child- 
hood and  since,  from  others,  I  felt  that  it  was  rather 


MARY  MOODY  EMERSON.  387 

the  order  of  tilings  than  their  individual  fault.  It 
was  from  being  early  impressed  by  my  poor  unprac- 
tical aunt,  that  Providence  and  Prayer  were  all  in 
all.  Poor  woman  !  Could  her  own  temper  in  child- 
hood or  age  have  been  subdued,  how  happy  for  her- 
self, who  had  a  warm  heart ;  but  for  me  would  have 
prevented  those  early  lessons  of  fortitude,  which  her 
caprices  taught  me  to  practise.  Had  I  prospered 
in  life,  what  a  proud,  excited  being,  even  to  fever- 
ishness,  I  might  have  been.  Loving  to  shine,  flat- 
tered and  flattering,  anxious,  and  wrapped  in  others, 
frail  and  feverish  as  myself." 

She  alludes  to  the  early  days  of  her  solitude,  sixty 
years  afterward,  on  her  own  farm  in  Maine,  speak- 
ing sadly  the  thoughts  suggested  by  the  rich  au- 
tumn landscape  around  her :  "  Ah !  as  I  walked  out 
this  afternoon,  so  sad  was  wearied  Nature  that  I  felt 
her  whisper  to  me,  '  Even  these  leaves  you  use  to 
think  my  better  emblems  have  lost  their  charm  on 
me  too,  and  I  weary  of  my  pilgrimage,  —  tired  that 
I  must  again  be  clothed  in  the  grandeurs  of  winter, 
and  anon  be  bedizened  in  flowers  and  cascades. 
Oh,  if  there  be  a  power  superior  to  me,  —  and  that 
there  is,  my  own  dread  fetters  proclaim,  —  when 
will  He  let  my  lights  go  out,  my  tides  cease  to  an 
eternal  ebb?  Oh  for  transformation!  I  am  not 
infinite,  nor  have  I  power  or  will,  but  bound  and 
imprisoned,  the  tool  of  mind,  even  of  the  beings  I 


MARY  MOODY  EMERSON. 

feed  and  adorn.  Vital,  I  feel  not :  not  active,  but 
passive,  and  cannot  aid  the  creatures  which  seem  my 
progeny,  —  myself.  But  you  are  ingrate  to  tire  of 
me,  now  you  want  to  look  beyond.  'T  was  I  who 
soothed  your  thorny  childhood,  though  you  knew  me 
not,  and  you  were  placed  in  my  most  leafless  waste. 
Yet  I  comforted  thee  when  going  on  the  daily  er- 
rand, fed  thee  with  my  mallows,  on  the  first  young 
day  of  bread  failing.  More,  I  led  thee  when  thou 
knewest  not  a  syllable  of  my  active  Cause,  (any 
more  than  if  it  had  been  dead  eternal  matter,)  to 
that  Cause ;  and  from  the  solitary  heart  taught  thee 
to  say,  at  first  womanhood,  Alive  with  God  is 
enough,  —  'tis  rapture.5  " 

"  This  morning  rich  in  existence  ;  the  remem- 
brance of  past  destitution  in  the  deep  poverty  of 
my  aunt,  and  her  most  unhappy  temper;  of  bit- 
terer days  of  youth  and  age,  when  my  senses  and 
understanding  seemed  but  means  of  labor,  or  to 
learn  my  own  unpopular  destiny,  and  that  —  but  no 
more ;  —  joy,  hope  and  resignation  unite  me  to  Him 
whose  mysterious  Will  adjusts  everything,  and  the 
darkest  and  lightest  are  alike  welcome.  Oh !  could 
this  state  of  mind  continue,  death  would  not  be 
longed  for."  "  I  felt,  till  above  twenty  years  old, 
as  though  Christianity  were  as  necessary  to  the 
world  as  existence;  —  was  ignorant  that  it  was 
lately  promulged,  or  partially  received."     Later; 


MARY  MOODY  EMERSON.  389 

*  Could  I  have  those  hours  in  which  in  fresh  youth 
I  said,  To  obey  God  is  joy,  though  there  were  no 
hereafter,  I  should  rejoice,  though  returning  to 
dust." 

"  Folly  follows  me  as  the  shadow  does  the  form. 
Yet  my  whole  life  devoted  to  find  some  new  truth 
which  will  link  me  closer  to  God.  And  the  simple 
principle  which  made  me  say,  in  youth  and  laborious 
poverty,  that,  should  He  make  me  a  blot  on  the  fair 
face  of  his  Creation,  I  should  rejoice  in  His  will, 
has  never  been  equalled,  though  it  returns  in  the 
long  life  of  destitution  like  an  Angel.  I  end  days 
of  fine  health  and  cheerfulness  without  getting  up- 
ward now.  How  did  I  use  to  think  them  lost !  If 
more  liberal  views  of  the  divine  government  make 
me  think  nothing  lost  which  carries  me  to  His  now 
hidden  presence,  there  may  be  danger  of  losing  and 
causing  others  the  loss  of  that  awe  and  sobriety  so 
indispensable." 

She  was  addressed  and  offered  marriage  by  a 
man  of  talents,  education  and  good  social  position, 
whom  she  respected.  The  proposal  gave  her  pause 
and  much  to  think,  but  after  consideration  she  re- 
fused it,  I  know  not  on  what  grounds  :  but  a  few 
allusions  to  it  in  her  diary  suggest  that  it  was  a  re- 
ligious act,  and  it  is  easy  to  see  that  she  could 
hardly  promise  herself  sympathy  in  her  religious 
abandonment  with  any  but  a  rarely- found  partner. 


890  MARY  MOODY  EMERSON. 

"  1807.  Jan.  19,  Maiden  [alluding  to  the  sale 
of  her  farm].  Last  night  I  cpoke  two  sentences 
about  that  foolish  place,  which  I  most  bitterly  la- 
ment, —  not  because  they  were  improper,  but  they 
arose  from  anger.  It  is  difficult,  when  we  have  no 
kind  of  barrier,  to  command  our  feelings.  But  this 
shall  teach  me.  It  humbles  me  beyond  anything 
I  have  met,  to  find  myself  for  a  moment  affected 
with  hope,  fear,  or  especially  anger,  about  interest. 
But  I  did  overcome  and  return  kindness  for  the 
repeated  provocations.  What  is  it  ?  My  uncle 
has  been  the  means  of  lessening  my  property.  Ki- 
diculous  to  wound  him  for  that.  He  was  honestly 
seeking  his  own.  But  at  last,  this  very  night,  the 
bargain  is  closed,  and  I  am  delighted  with  my- 
self :  —  my  dear  self  has  done  well.  Never  did  I 
so  exult  in  a  trifle.  Happy  beginning  of  my  bar- 
gain, though  the  sale  of  the  place  appears  to  me 
one  of  the  worst  things  for  me  at  this  time." 

"  Jan.  21.  Weary  at  times  of  objects  so  tedious 
to  hear  and  see.  O  the  power  of  vision,  then  the 
delicate  power  of  the  nerve  which  receives  impres- 
sions from  sounds  !  If  ever  I  am  blest  with  a  social 
life,  let  the  accent  be  grateful.  Could  I  at  times 
be  regaled  with  music,  it  would  remind  me  that 
there  are  sounds.  Shut  up  in  this  severe  weather 
with  careful,  infirm,  afflicted  age,  it  is  wonderful, 
my  spirits :  hopes  I  can  have  none.     Not  a  pros- 


MARY  MOODY  EMERSON.  391 

pect  but  is  dark  on  earth,  as  to  knowledge  and  joy 
from  externals :  but  the  prospect  of  a  dying  bed 
reflects  lustre  on  all  the  rest. 

"The  evening  is  fine,  but  I  dare  not  enjoy  ito 
The  moon  and  stars  reproach  me,  because  I  had  to 
do  with  mean  fools.  Should  I  take  so  much  care  to 
save  a  few  dollars  ?  Never  was  I  so  much  ashamed. 
Did  I  say  with  what  rapture  I  might  disj)ose  of 
them  to  the  poor  ?  Pho  !  self-preservation,  dignity, 
confidence  in  the  future,  contempt  of  trifles !  Alas, 
I  am  disgraced.  Took  a  momentary  revenge  on 
for  worrying  me." 

"  Jan.  30.  I  walked  to  Captain  Dexter's.  Sick. 
Promised  never  to  put  that  ring  on.  Ended  mis- 
erably the  month  which  began  so  worldly. 

"  It  was  the  choice  of  the  Eternal  that  gave  the 
glowing  seraph  his  joys,  and  to  me  my  vile  im- 
prisonment. I  adore  Him.  It  was  His  will  that 
gives  my  superiors  to  shine  in  wisdom,  friendship, 
and  ardent  pursuits,  while  I  pass  my  youth,  its  last 
traces,  in  the  veriest  shades  of  ignorance  and  com- 
plete destitution  of  society.  I  praise  Him,  though 
when  my  strength  of  body  falters,  it  is  a  trial  not 
easily  described." 

"  True,  I  must  finger  the  very  farthing  candle- 
ends,  —  the  duty  assigned  to  my  pride ;  and  indeed 
so  poor  are  some  of  those  allotted  to  join  me  on  the 
weary  needy  path,  that 't  is  benevolence  enjoins  self- 


392  MARY  MOODY  EMERSON. 

denial.  Could  I  but  dare  it  in  the  bread-and-water 
diet !  Could  I  but  live  free  from  calculation,  as  in 
the  first  half  of  life,  when  my  poor  aunt  lived.  I 
had  ten  dollars  a  year  for  clothes  and  charity,  and 
I  never  remember  to  have  been  needy,  though  I 
never  had  but  two  or  three  aids  in  those  six  years 
of  earning  my  home.  That  ten  dollars  my  dear 
father  earned,  and  one  hundred  dollars  remain,  and 
I  can't  bear  to  take  it,  and  don't  know  what  to  do. 

Yet  I  would  not  breathe  to or my  want. 

'T  is  only  now  that  I  would  not  let pay  my 

hotel-bill.  They  have  enough  to  do.  Besides,  it 
would  send  me  packing  to  depend  for  anything. 
Better  anything  than  dishonest  dependence,  which 
robs  the  poorer,  and  despoils  friendship  of  equal 
connection." 

In  1830,  in  one  of  her  distant  homes,  she  re- 
proaches herself  with  some  sudden  passion  she  has 
for  visiting  her  old  home  and  friends  in  the  city, 
where  she  had  lived  for  a  while  with  her  brother 
[Mr.  Emerson's  father]  and  afterwards  with  his 
widow.  "  Do  I  yearn  to  be  in  Boston  ?  'T  would 
fatigue,  disappoint ;  I,  who  have  so  long  despised 
means,  who  have  always  found  it  a  sort  of  rebellion 
to  seek  them  ?  Yet  the  old  desire  for  the  worm  is 
not  so  greedy  as  [mine]  to  find  myself  in  my  old 
haunts." 

1833.    "The  difficulty  of  getting  places  of  low 


MARY  MOODY  EMERSON.  393 

board  for  a  lady,  is  obvious.  And,  at  moments,  I 
am  tired  out.  Yet  how  independent,  bow  better 
than  to  bang  on  friends  !  And  sometimes  I  fancy 
that  I  am  emptied  and  peeled  to  carry  some  seed 
to  tbe  ignorant,  which  no  idler  wind  can  so  well 
dispense."  "  Hard  to  contend  for  a  health  which 
is  daily  used  in  petition  for  a  final  close."  "  Am 
I,  poor  victim,  swept  on  through  the  sternest  ordi- 
nations of  nature's  laws  which  slay  ?  yet  I  '11  trust." 
"  There  was  great  truth  in  what  a  pious  enthusiast 
said,  that,  if  God  should  cast  him  into  hell,  he 
would  yet  clasp  his  hands  around  Him." 

"  Newburyport,  Sept.  1822.  High,  solemn,  en- 
trancing noon,  prophetic  of  the  approach  of  the 
Presiding  Spirit  of  Autumn.  God  preserve  my 
reason  !  Alone,  feeling  strongly,  fully,  that  I  have 
deserved  nothing ;  according  to  Adam  Smith's 
idea  of  society,  4  done  nothing ; '  doing  nothing, 
never  expect  to  ;  yet  joying  in  existence,  perhaps 
striving  to  beautify  one  individual  of  God's  crea- 
tion. 

"  Our  civilization  is  not  always  mending  our  poe- 
try. It  is  sauced  and  spiced  with  our  complexity 
of  arts  and  inventions,  but  lacks  somewhat  of  the 
grandeur  that  belongs  to  a  Doric  and  unphilosophi- 
cal  age.  In  a  religious  contemplative  public  it 
would  have  less  outward  variety,  but  simpler  and 
grander  means  ;  a  few  pulsations  of  created  beings, 


894  MARY  MOODY  EMERSON. 

a  few  successions  of  acts,  a  few  lamps  held  out  in 
the  firmament  enable  us  to  talk  of  Time,  make 
epochs,  write  histories,  —  to  do  more,  —  to  date 
the  revelations  of  God  to  man.  But  these  lamps 
are  held  to  measure  out  some  of  the  moments  of 
eternity,  to  divide  the  history  of  God's  operations 
in  the  birth  and  death  of  nations,  of  worlds.  It  is 
a  goodly  name  for  our  notions  of  breathing,  suffer- 
ing, enjoying,  acting.  We  personify  it.  We  call 
it  by  every  name  of  fleeting,  dreaming,  vaporing 
imagery.  Yet  it  is  nothing.  We  exist  in  eternity. 
Dissolve  the  body  and  the  night  is  gone,  the  stars 
are  extinguished,  and  we  measure  duration  by  the 
number  of  our  thoughts,  by  the  activity  of  reason, 
the  discovery  of  truths,  the  acquirement  of  virtue, 
the  approach  to  God.  And  the  gray-headed  god 
throws  his  shadows  all  around,  and  his  slaves  catch, 
now  at  this,  now  at  that,  one  at  the  halo  he  throws 
around  poetry,  or  pebbles,  bugs,  or  bubbles.  Some- 
times they  climb,  sometimes  creep  into  the  meanest 
holes  —  but  they  are  all  alike  in  vanishing,  like 
the  shadow  of  a  cloud." 

To  her  nephew  Charles  :  "  War ;  what  do  I 
think  of  it  ?  Why  in  your  ear  I  think  it  so  much 
better  than  oppression  that  if  it  were  ravaging  the 
whole  geography  of  despotism  it  would  be  an 
omen  of  high  and  glorious  import.  Channing 
paints  its  miseries,  but  does  he  know  those  of   a 


MARY  MOGDY  EMERSON.  395 

worse  war,  —  private  animosities,  pinching,  bitter 
warfare  of  the  human  heart,  the  cruel  oppression  of 
the  poor  by  the  rich,  which  corrupts  old  worlds  ? 
How  much  better,  more  honest,  are  storming  and 
conflagration  of  towns !  They  are  but  letting 
blood  which  corrupts  into  worms  and  dragons.  A 
war-trump  would  be  harmony  to  the  jars  of  theolo- 
gians and  statesmen  such  as  the  papers  bring.  It 
was  the  glory  of  the  Chosen  People,  nay,  it  is  said 
there  was  war  in  Heaven.  War  is  among  the 
means  of  discipline,  the  rough  meliorators,  and  no 
worse  than  the  strife  with  poverty,  malice  and  igno- 
rance. War  devastates  the  conscience  of  men,  yet 
corrupt  peace  does  not  less.  And  if  you  tell  me  of 
the  miseries  of  the  battle-field,  with  the  sensitive 
Channing,  (of  whose  love  of  life  I  am  ashamed), 
what  of  a  few  days  of  agony,  what  of  a  vulture  be- 
ing the  bier,  tomb  and  parson  of  a  hero,  compared 
to  the  long  years  of  sticking  on  a  bed  and  wished 
away  ?  For  the  widows  and  orphans —  Oh,  I  could 
give  facts  of  the  long-drawn  years  of  imprisoned 
minds  and  hearts,  which  uneducated  orphans  en- 
dure ! 

"  O  Time !  Thou  loiterer.  Thou,  whose  might 
has  laid  low  the  vastest  and  crushed  the  worm, 
restest  on  thy  hoary  throne,  with  like  potency  over 
thy  agitations  and  thy  graves.  When  will  thy 
routines  give  way  to  higher  and  lasting    institu- 


896  MARY  MOODY  EMERSON. 

tions  ?  When  thy  trophies  and  thy  name  and  all 
its  wizard  forms  be  lost  in  the  Genius  of  Eternity  ? 
In  Eternity,  no  deceitful  promises,  no  fantastic 
illusions,  no  riddles  concealed  by  thy  shrouds,  none 
of  thy  Arachnean  webs,  which  decoy  and  destroy. 
Hasten  to  finish  thy  motley  work,  on  which  fright- 
ful Gorgons  are  at  play,  spite  of  holy  ghosts.  'T  is 
already  moth-eaten  and  its  shuttles  quaver,  as  the 
beams  of  the  loom  are  shaken. 

"  Sat.  25.  Hail  requiem  of  departed  Time  ■ 
Never  was  incumbent's  funeral  followed  by  expect- 
ant heir  with  more  satisfaction.  Yet  not  his  hope 
is  mine.  For  in  the  weary  womb  are  prolific  num- 
bers of  the  same  sad  hour,  colored  by  the  memory 
of  defeats  in  virtue,  by  the  prophecy  of  others, 
more  dreary,  blind  and  sickly.  Yet  He  who  formed 
thy  web,  who  stretched  thy  warp  from  long  ages, 
has  graciously  given  man  to  throw  his  shuttle,  or 
feel  he  does,  and  irradiate  the  filling  woof  with 
many  a  flowery  rainbow,  —  labors,  rather  —  evan- 
escent efforts,  which  will  wear  like  flowerets  in 
brighter  soils  ;  —  has  attuned  his  mind  in  such  uni- 
son with  the  harp  of  the  universe,  that  he  is  never 
without  some  chord  of  hope's  music.  'T  is  not  in 
the  nature  of  existence,  while  there  is  a  God,  to  be 
without  the  pale  of  excitement.  When  the  dreamy 
pages  of  life  seem  all  turned  and  folded  down  to 
very  weariness,  even  this  idea  of  those  who  fill  the 


MARY  MOODY  EMERSON.  397 

hour  with  crowded  virtues,  lifts  the  spectator  to 
other  worlds,  and  he  adores  the  eternal  purposes  of 
Him  who  lifteth  up  and  casteth  down,  bringeth  to 
dust,  and  raiseth  to  the  skies.  'T  is  a  strange  defic- 
iency in  Brougham's  title  of  a  System  of  Natural 
Theology,  when  the  moral  constitution  of  the  be- 
ing for  whom  these  contrivances  were  made  is  not 
recognized.  The  wonderful  inhabitant  of  the  build- 
ing to  which  unknown  ages  were  the  mechanics,  is 
left  out  as  to  that  part  where  the  Creator  had  put 
his  own  lighted  candle,  placed  a  vice-gerent.  Not 
to  complain  of  the  poor  old  earth's  chaotic  state, 
brought  so  near  in  its  long  and  gloomy  transmut- 
ings  by  the  geologist.  Yet  its  youthful  charms  as 
decked  by  the  hand  of  Moses'  Cosmogony,  will  lin- 
ger about  the  heart,  while  Poetry  succumbs  to 
Science.  Yet  there  is  a  sombre  music  in  the  whirl 
of  times  so  long  gone  by.  And  the  bare  bones  of 
this  poor  embryo  earth  may  give  the  idea  of  the  In- 
finite far,  far  better  than  when  dignified  with  arts 
and  industry  :  —  its  oceans,  when  beating  the  sym- 
bols of  ceaseless  ages,  than  when  covered  with  car- 
goes of  war  and  oppression.  How  grand  its  prep- 
aration for  souls,  —  souls  who  were  to  feel  the 
Divinity,  before  Science  had  dissected  the  emotions, 
and  applied  its  steely  analysis  to  that  state  of  be- 
ing which  recognizes  neither  psychology  nor  ele- 
ment. 


398  MARY  MOODY  EMERSON. 

"September,  1836.  Yale.  The  mystic  dream 
winch  is  shed  over  the  season.  O,  to  dream  more 
deeply ;  to  lose  external  objects  a  little  more !  Yet 
the  hold  on  them  is  so  slight,  that  duty  is  lost  sight 
of  perhaps,  at  times.  Sadness  is  better  than  walk- 
ing talking  acting  somnambulism.  Yes,  this  en- 
tire solitude  with  the  Being  who  makes  the  powers 
of  life !  Even  Fame,  which  lives  in  other  states  of 
Virtue,  palls.  Usefulness,  if  it  requires  action, 
seems  less  like  existence  than  the  desire  of  being 
absorbed  in  God,  retaining  consciousness.  Num- 
ber the  waste-places  of  the  journey,  —  the  secret 
martyrdom  of  youth,  heavier  than  the  stake,  I 
thought,  the  narrow  limits  which  know  no  outlet, 
the  bitter  dregs  of  the  cup,  —  and  all  are  sweetened 
by  the  purpose  of  Him  I  love.  The  idea  of  being 
no  mate  for  those  intellectualists  I  've  loved  to  ad- 
mire, is  no  pain.  Hereafter  the  same  solitary  joy 
will  go  with  me,  were  I  not  to  live,  as  I  expect,  in 
the  vision  of  the  Infinite.  Never  do  the  feelings 
of  the  Infinite,  and  the  consciousness  of  finite 
frailty  and  ignorance,  harmonize  so  well  as  at  this 
mystic  season  in  the  deserts  of  life.  Contradic- 
tions, the  modern  German  says,  of  the  Infinite  and 
finite." 

I  sometimes  fancy  I  detect  in  her  writings,  a 
certain  —  shall  I  say  —  polite  and  courtly  homage 
£o  the  name  and  dignity  of  Jesus,  not  at  all  spon- 


MARY  MOODY  EMERSON.  399 

taneous,  but  growing  out  of  her  respect  to  the  Rev- 
elation,  and  really  veiling  and  betraying  her  or- 
ganic* dislike  to  any  interference,  any  mediation 
between  her  and  the  Author  of  her  being,  assur- 
ance of  whose  direct  dealing  with  her  she  inces- 
santly invokes :  for  example,  the  parenthesis  "  Sav- 
ing thy  presence,  Priest  and  Medium  of  all  this 
approach  for  a  sinful  creature  !  "  "  Were  it  possi- 
ble that  the  Creator  was  not  virtually  present  with 
the  spirits  and  bodies  which  He  has  made :  —  if 
it  were  in  the  nature  of  things  possible  He  could 
withdraw  himself,  —  I  would  hold  on  to  the  faith, 
that,  at  some  moment  of  His  existence,  I  was  pres- 
ent :  that,  though  cast  from  Him,  my  sorrows,  my 
ignorance  and  meanness  were  a  part  of  His  plan  ; 
my  death,  too,  however  long  and  tediously  delayed 
to  prayer,  —  was  decreed,  was  fixed.  Oh  how 
weary  in  youth  —  more  so  scarcely  now,  not  when- 
ever I  can  breathe,  as  it  seems,  the  atmosphere  of 
the  Omnipresence :  then  I  ask  not  faith  nor  knowl- 
edge; honors,  pleasures,  labors,  I  always  refuse, 
compared  to  this  divine  partaking  of  existence ;  — 
but  how  rare,  how  dependent  on  the  organs  through 
which  the  soul  operates  ! 

The  sickness  of  the  last  week  was  fine  medicine ; 
pain  disintegrated  the  spirit,  or  became  spiritual. 
I  rose, — I  felt  that  I  had  given  to  God  more  per- 
haps than  an  angel  could,  —  had  promised  Him 


400  MARY  MOODY  EMERSON. 

in  youth  that  to  be  a  blot  on  this  fair  world,  at  His 
command,  would  be  acceptable.  Constantly  offer 
myself  to  continue  the  obscurest  and  loneliest  thing 
ever  heard  of,  with  one  proviso,  —  His  agency. 
Yes,  love  Thee,  and  all  Thou  dost,  while  Thou 
sheddest  frost  and  darkness  on  every  path  of 
mine." 

For  years  she  had  her  bed  made  in  the  form  of 
a  coffin ;  and  delighted  herself  with  the  discovery 
of  the  figure  of  a  coffin  made  every  evening  on 
their  sidewalk,  by  the  shadow  of  a  church  tower 
which  adjoined  the  house. 

Saladin  caused  his  shroud  to  be  made,  and  car- 
ried it  to  battle  as  his  standard.  She  made  up  her 
shroud,  and  death  still  refusing  to  come,  and  she 
thinking  it  a  pity  to  let  it  lie  idle,  wore  it  as  a 
night-gown,  or  a  day-gown,  nay,  went  out  to  ride 
in  it,  on  horseback,  in  her  mountain  roads,  until  it 
was  worn  out.  Then  she  had  another  made  up, 
and  as  she  never  travelled  without  being  provided 
for  this  dear  and  indispensable  contingency,  I  be- 
lieve she  wore  out  a  great  many. 

"  1833.  I  have  given  up,  the  last  year  or  two, 
the  hope  of  dying.  In  the  lowest  ebb  of  health 
nothing  is  ominous ;  diet  and  exercise  restore.  So 
it  seems  best  to  get  that  very  humbling  business  of 
insurance.  I  enter  my  dear  sixty  the  last  of  this 
month."     "1835,  June  16.    Tedious  indisposition: 


MARY  MOODY  EMERSON.  401 

—  hoped,  as  it  took  a  new  form,  it  would  open  the 
cool,  sweet  grave.  Now  existence  itself  in  any 
form  is  sweet.  Away  with  knowledge ;  —  God 
alone.  He  communicates  this  our  condition  and 
humble  waiting,  or  I  should  never  perceive  Him. 
Science,  Nature,  —  O,  I  've  yearned  to  open  some 
page ;  —  not  now,  too  late.  Ill  health  and  nerves. 
O  dear  worms, — how  they  will  at  some  sure  time 
take  down  this  tedious  tabernacle,  most  valuable 
companions,  instructors  in  the  science  of  mind,  by 
gnawing  away  the  meshes  which  have  chained  it. 
A  very  Beatrice  in  showing  the  Paradise.  Yes,  I 
irk  under  contact  with  forms  of  depravity,  while  I 
am  resigned  to  being  nothing,  never  expect  a  palm, 
a  laurel,  hereafter." 

"  1826,  July.  If  one  could  choose,  and  without 
crime  be  gibbeted,  —  were  it  not  altogether  better 
than  the  long  drooping  away  by  age  without  men- 
tality or  devotion  ?  The  vulture  and  crow  would 
caw  caw,  and,  unconscious  of  any  deformity  in  the 
mutilated  body,  would  relish  their  meal,  make  no 
grimace  of  affected  sympathy,  nor  suffer  any  real 
compassion.  I  pray  to  die,  though  happier  myr- 
iads and  mine  own  companions  press  nearer  to 
the  throne.  His  coldest  beam  will  purify  and  ren- 
der me  forever  holy.  Had  I  the  highest  place  of 
acquisition  and  diffusing  virtue  here,  the  principle 
of  human  sympathy  would  be  too  strong  for  that 


402  MARY  MOODY  EMERSON. 

rapt  emotion,  that  severe  delight  which  I  crave ; 
nay  for  that  kind  of  obscure  virtue  which  is  so  rich 
to  lay  at  the  feet  of  the  Author  of  morality.  Those 
economists  (Adam  Smith)  who  say  nothing  is 
added  to  the  wealth  of  a  nation  but  what  is  dug 
out  of  the  earth,  and  that,  whatever  disposition  of 
virtue  may  exist,  unless  something  is  done  for  so- 
ciety, deserves  no  fame,  —  why  I  am  content  with 
such  paradoxical  kind  of  facts ;  but  one  secret 
sentiment  of  virtue,  disinterested  (or  perhaps  not), 
is  worthy,  and  will  tell,  in  the  world  of  spirits,  of 
God's  immediate  presence,  more  than  the  blood  of 
many  a  martyr  who  has  it  not."  "  I  have  heard 
that  the  greatest  geniuses  have  died  ignorant  of 
their  power  and  influence  on  the  arts  and  sciences. 
I  believe  thus  much,  that  their  large  perception 
consumed  their  egotism,  or  made  it  impossible  for 
them  to  make  small  calculations." 

"That  greatest  of  all  gifts,  however  small  my 
power  of  receiving,  —  the  capacity,  the  element  to 
love  the  All-perfect,  without  regard  to  personal 
happiness :  —  happiness ?  —  'tis  itself."  She  checks 
herself  amid  her  passionate  prayers  for  immediate 
communion  with  God ;  —  "I  who  never  made  a 
sacrifice  to  record,  —  I  cowering  in  the  nest  of 
quiet  for  so  many  years ;  —  I  indulge  the  delight 
of  sympathizing  with  great  virtues,  —  blessing  their 
Original :   Have  I  this   right  ? "     "  While  I   am 


MARY  MOODY  EMERSON.  403 

sympathizing  in  the  government  of  God  over  the 
world,  perhaps  I  lose  nearer  views.  Well,  I 
learned  his  existence  a  priori.  No  object  of  sci- 
ence or  observation  ever  was  pointed  out  to  me  by 
my  poor  aunt,  but  His  Being  and  commands ;  and 
oh  how  much  I  trusted  Him  with  every  event  till 
I  learned  the  order  of  human  events  from  the  pres- 
sure of  wants." 

"  What  a  timid,  ungrateful  creature  !  Fear  the 
deepest  pit-falls  of  age,  when  pressing  on,  in  imag- 
ination at  least,  to  Him  with  whom  a  day  is  a  thou- 
sand years,  —  with  whom  all  miseries  and  irregu- 
larities are  conforming  to  universal  good  !  Shame 
on  me  who  have  learned  within  three  years  to  sit 
whole  days  in  peace  and  enjoyment  without  the 
least  apparent  benefit  to  any,  or  knowledge  to  my- 
self ;  —  resigned,  too,  to  the  memory  of  long  years 
of  slavery  passed  in  labor  and  ignorance,  to  the 
loss  of  that  character  which  I  once  thought  and 
felt  so  sure  of,  without  ever  being  conscious  of  act- 
ing from  calculation." 

Her  friends  used  to  say  to  her,  "  I  wish  you  joy 
of  the  worm."  And  when  at  last  her  release  ar- 
rived, the  event  of  her  death  had  really  such  a 
comic  tinge  in  the  eyes  of  every  one  who  knew  her, 
that  her  friends  feared  they  might,  at  her  funeral, 
not  dare  to  look  at  each  other,  lest  they  should  for- 
get the  serious  proprieties  of  the  hour. 


404  MARY  MOODY  EMERSON. 

She  gave  high  counsels.  It  was  the  privilege  of 
certain  boys  to  have  this  immeasurably  high  stand- 
ard indicated  to  their  childhood ;  a  blessing  which 
nothing  else  in  education  could  supply.  It  is  frivo- 
lous to  ask,  —  "  And  was  she  ever  a  Christian  in 
practice  ?  "  Cassandra  uttered,  to  a  frivolous,  skep- 
tical time,  the  arcana  of  the  Gods  :  but  it  is  easy 
to  believe  that  Cassandra  domesticated  in  a  lady's 
house  would  have  proved  a  troublesome  boarder. 
Is  it  the  less  desirable  to  have  the  lofty  abstractions 
because  the  abstractionist  is  nervous  and  irritable? 
Shall  we  not  keep  Flamsteed  and  Herschel  in  the 
observatory,  though  it  should  even  be  proved  that 
they  neglected  to  rectify  their  own  kitchen  clock  ? 
It  is  essential  to  the  safety  of  every  mackerel  fisher 
that  latitudes  and  longitudes  should  be  astronomi- 
cally ascertained  ;  and  so  every  banker,  shopkeeper 
and  wood-sawyer  has  a  stake  in  the  elevation  of 
the  moral  code  by  saint  and  prophet.  Very  rightly, 
then,  the  Christian  ages,  proceeding  on  a  grand  in- 
stinct, have  said:  Faith  alone,  Faith  alone. 


SAMUEL   HOAR. 

'  Maguo  se  judice  quisque  tuetur ; 
Victrix  causa  deis  placuit  sed  victa  Catoni. 


A  year  ago,  how  often  did  we  meet 

Beneath  these  elms,  once  more  in  sober  bloom, 
Thy  tall,  sad  figure  pacing  down  the  street, 

And  now  the  robin  sings  above  thy  tomb  ! 
Thy  name  on  other  shores  may  ne'er  be  known, 

Though  Rome  austere  no  graver  consul  knew, 
But  Massachusetts  her  true  son  shall  own  ; 

Out  of  her  soil  thy  hardy  virtues  grew. 
She  loves  the  man  that  chose  the  conquered  causey 

With  upright  soul  that  bowed  to  God  alone ; 
The  clean  hands  that  upheld  her  equal  laws, 

The  old  religion  ne'er  to  be  outgrown ; 
The  cold  demeanor,  the  warm  heart  beneath, 
The  simple  grandeur  of  thy  lif e  and  death. 

F.  B.  Sanborn* 
April,  1857. 


SAMUEL  HOAR.1 


Here  is  a  day  on  which  more  public  good  or  evil 
is  to  be  done  than  was  ever  done  on  any  day.  And 
this  is  the  pregnant  season,  when  our  old  Roman, 
Samuel  Hoar,  has  chosen  to  quit  this  world.  Ab 
iniquo  certamine  indigndbundus  recessit. 

He  was  born  under  a  Christian  and  humane  star, 
full  of  mansuetude  and  nobleness,  honor  and  char- 
ity ;  and,  whilst  he  was  willing  to  face  every  dis- 
agreeable duty,  whilst  he  dared  to  do  all  that  might 
beseem  a  man,  his  self-respect  restrained  him  from 
any  foolhardiness.  The  Homeric  heroes,  when  they 
saw  the  gods  mingling  in  the  fray,  sheathed  their 
swords.  So  did  not  he  feel  any  call  to  make  it 
a  contest  of  personal  strength  with  mobs  or  na- 
tions ;  but  when  he  saw  the  day  and  the  gods  went 
against  him,  he  withdrew,  but  with  an  unaltered 
belief.  All  was  conquered  prceter  atrocem  aril- 
mum  Catonis. 

At  the  time  when  he  went  to  South  Carolina  as 

1  Written  on  the  4th  Nov.,  1856,  the  day  when  Mr.  Bu- 
chanan was  chosen  President  of  the  United  States.  Re- 
printed from  Putnam's  Magazine. 


408  SAMUEL  HOAR 

the  Commissioner  of  Massachusetts,  in  1844,  whilst 
staying  in  Charleston,  pending  his  correspondence 
with  the  governor  and  the  legal  officers,  he  was  re- 
peatedly warned  that  it  was  not  safe  for  him  to  ap- 
pear in  public,  or  to  take  his  daily  walk,  as  he  had 
done,  unattended  by  his  friends,  in  the  streets  of 
the  city.  He  was  advised  to  withdraw  to  private 
lodgings,  which  were  eagerly  offered  him  by  friends. 
He  rejected  the  advice,  and  refused  the  offers,  say- 
ing that  he  was  old,  and  his  life  was  not  worth 
much,  but  he  had  rather  the  boys  should  troll  his 
old  head  like  a  foot-ball  in  their  streets,  than  that 
he  should  hide  it.  And  he  continued  the  uniform 
practice  of  his  daily  walk  into  all  parts  of  the  city. 
But  when  the  mob  of  Charleston  was  assembled  in 
the  streets  before  his  hotel,  and  a  deputation  of 
gentlemen  waited  upon  him  in  the  hall  to  say  they 
had  come  with  the  unanimous  voice  of  the  State  to 
remove  him  by  force,  and  the  carriage  was  at  the 
door,  he  considered  his  duty  discharged  to  the  last 
point  of  possibility.  The  force  was  apparent  and 
irresistible ;  the  legal  officer's  part  was  up ;  it  was 
now  time  for  the  military  officer  to  be  sent ;  and  he 
said,  "  Well,  gentlemen,  since  it  is  your  pleasure  to 
use  force,  I  must  go."  But  his  opinion  was  un- 
changed. 

In  like  manner  now,  when  the  votes  of  the  Free 
States,  as  shown  in  the  recent  election  in  the  Stat© 


SAMUEL  HOAR.  409 

of  Pennsylvania,  had  disappointed  the  hopes  of 
mankind  and  betrayed  the  cause  of  freedom,  he 
considered  the  question  of  justice  and  liberty,  for 
his  age,  lost,  and  had  no  longer  the  will  to  drag  his 
days  through  the  dishonors  of  the  long  defeat,  and 
promptly  withdrew,  but  with  unaltered  belief. 

He  was  a  very  natural,  but  a  very  high  character ; 
a  man  of  simple  tastes,  plain  and  true  in  speech, 
with  a  clear  perception  of  justice,  and  a  perfect 
obedience  thereto  in  his  action ;  of  a  strong  under- 
standing, precise  and  methodical,  which  gave  him 
great  eminence  in  the  legal  profession.  It  was 
rather  his  reputation  for  severe  method  in  his  intel- 
lect than  any  special  direction  in  his  studies  that 
caused  him  to  be  offered  the  mathematical  chair  in 
Harvard  University,  when  vacant  in  1806.  The 
severity  of  his  logic  might  have  inspired  fear,  had  it 
not  been  restrained  by  his  natural  reverence,  which 
made  him  modest  and  courteous,  though  his  court- 
esy had  a  grave  and  almost  military  air.  He  com- 
bined a  uniform  self-respect  with  a  natural  rever- 
ence for  every  other  man ;  so  that  it  was  perfectly 
easy  for  him  to  associate  with  farmers,  and  with 
plain,  uneducated,  poor  men,  and  he  had  a  strong, 
unaffected  interest  in  farms,  and  crops,  and  weath- 
ers, and  the  common  incidents  of  rural  life.  It  was 
just  as  easy  for  him  to  meet  on  the  same  floor,  and 
with  the  same  plain  courtesy,  men  of  distinction 


410  SAMUEL  HOAR. 

and  large  ability.  He  was  fond  of  farms  and  trees, 
fond  of  birds,  and  attentive  to  their  manners  and 
habits ;  addicted  to  long  and  retired  walks  ;  temper- 
ate to  asceticism,  for  no  lesson  of  his  experience 
was  lost  on  him,  and  his  self-command  was  perfect. 
Though  rich,  of  a  plainness  and  almost  poverty  of 
personal  expenditure,  yet  liberal  of  his  money  to 
any  worthy  use,  readily  lending  it  to  young  men, 
and  industrious  men,  and  by  no  means  eager  to  re- 
claim of  them  either  the  interest  or  the  principal. 
He  was  open-handed  to  every  charity,  and  every 
public  claim  that  had  any  show  of  reason  in  it. 
When  I  talked  with  him  one  day  of  some  inequal- 
ity of  taxes  in  the  town,  he  said  it  was  his  practice 
to  pay  whatever  was  demanded ;  for,  though  he 
might  think  the  taxation  large  and  very  unequally 
proportioned,  yet  he  thought  the  money  might  as 
well  go  in  this  way  as  in  any  other. 

The  strength  and  the  beauty  of  the  man  lay  in 
the  natural  goodness  and  justice  of  his  mind,  which, 
in  manhood  and  in  old  age,  after  dealing  all  his  life 
with  weighty  private  and  public  interests,  left  an 
infantile  innocence,  of  which  we  have  no  second  or 
third  example,  —  the  strength  of  a  chief  united  to 
the  modesty  of  a  child.  He  returned  from  courts 
or  congresses  to  sit  down,  with  unaltered  humility, 
in  the  church  or  in  the  town-house,  on  the  plain 
wooden  bench  where  honor  came  and  sat  down 
beside  him. 


SAMUEL  HOAR.  411 

He  was  a  man  in  whom  so  rare  a  spirit  of  justice 
visibly  dwelt,  that  if  one  had  met  him  in  a  cabin  or 
in  a  forest  he  must  still  seem  a  public  man,  answer- 
ing as  sovereign  state  to  sovereign  state ;  and  might 
easily  suggest  Milton's  picture  of  John  Bradshaw, 
that  "  he  was  a  consul  from  whom  the  fasces  did 
not  depart  with  the  year,  but  in  private  seemed 
ever  sitting  in  judgment  on  kings."  Everybody 
knew  where  to  find  him.  What  he  said,  that  would 
he  do.  But  he  disdained  any  arts  in  his  speech : 
he  was  not  adorned  with  any  graces  of  rhetoric, 

"But  simple  truth  his  utmost  skill." 

So  cautious  was  he,  and  tender  of  the  truth,  that  he 
sometimes  wearied  his  audience  with  the  pains  he 
took  to  qualify  and  verify  his  statements,  adding 
clause  on  clause  to  do  justice  to  all  his  conviction. 
He  had  little  or  no  power  of  generalization.  But 
a  plain  way  he  had  of  putting  his  statement  with 
all  his  might,  and  now  and  then  borrowing  the  aid 
of  a  good  story,  or  a  farmer's  phrase,  whose  force 
had  imprinted  it  on  his  memory,  and,  by  the  same 
token,  his  hearers  were  bound  to  remember  his 
point. 

The  impression  he  made  on  juries  was  honorable 
to  him  and  them.  For  a  long  term  of  years,  he 
was  at  the  head  of  the  bar  in  Middlesex,  practising, 
also,  in  the  adjoining  counties.     He  had  one  side 


412  SAMUEL  HOAR. 

or  the  other  of  every  important  case,  and  his  influ- 
ence was  reckoned  despotic,  and  sometimes  com- 
plained of  as  a  bar  to  public  justice.  Many  good 
stories  are  still  told  of  the  perplexity  of  jurors  who 
found  the  law  and  the  evidence  on  one  side,  and  yet 
Squire  Hoar  had  said  that  he  believed,  on  his  eon- 
science,  his  client  entitled  to  a  verdict.  And  what 
Middlesex  jury,  containing  any  God-fearing  men 
in  it,  would  hazard  an  opinion  in  flat  contradiction 
to  what  Squire  Hoar  believed  to  be  just  ?  He  was 
entitled  to  this  respect ;  for  he  discriminated  in  the 
business  that  was  brought  to  him,  and  would  not 
argue  a  rotten  cause;  and  he  refused  very  large 
sums  offered  him  to  undertake  the  defense  of  crim- 
inal persons. 

His  character  made  him  the  conscience  of  the 
community  in  which  he  lived.  And  in  many  a 
town  it  was  asked,  "  What  does  Squire  Hoar  think 
of  this  ?  "  and  in  political  crises,  he  was  entreated 
to  write  a  few  lines  to  make  known  to  good  men  in 
Chelmsford,  or  Marlborough,  or  Shirley,  what  that 
opinion  was.  I  used  to  feel  that  his  conscience 
was  a  kind  of  meter  of  the  degree  of  honesty  in  the 
country,  by  which  on  each  occasion  it  was  tried, 
and  sometimes  found  wanting.  I  am  sorry  to  say 
he  could  not  be  elected  to  Congress  a  second  time 
from  Middlesex. 

And  in  his  own  town,  if  some  important  end  was 


SAMUEL  HOAR.  413 

to  be  gained,  —  as,  for  instance,  when  the  county 
commissioners  refused  to  rebuild  the  burned  court- 
house, on  the  belief  that  the  courts  would  be  trans- 
ferred from  Concord  to  Lowell,  —  all  parties  com- 
bined to  send  Mr.  Hoar  to  the  Legislature,  where 
his  presence  and  speech,  of  course,  secured  the  re- 
building ;  and,  of  course  also,  having  answered  our 
end,  we  passed  him  by  and  elected  somebody  else 
at  the  next  term. 

His  head,  with  singular  grace  in  its  lines,  had  a 
resemblance  to  the  bust  of  Dante.  He  retained  to 
the  last  the  erectness  of  his  tall  but  slender  form, 
and  not  less  the  full  strength  of  his  mind.  Such 
was,  in  old  age,  the  beauty  of  his  person  and  car- 
riage, as  if  the  mind  radiated,  and  made  the  same 
impression  of  probity  on  all  beholders.  His  beauty 
was  pathetic  and  touching  in  these  latest  days,  and, 
as  now  appears,  it  awakened  a  certain  tender  fear 
in  all  who  saw  him,  that  the  costly  ornament  of  our 
homes  and  halls  and  streets  was  speedily  to  be  re- 
moved. Yet  how  solitary  he  looked,  day  by  day  in 
the  world,  this  man  so  revered,  this  man  of  public 
life,  of  "large  acquaintance  and  wide  family  connec- 
tion !  Was  it  some  reserve  of  constitution,  or  was 
it  only  the  lot  of  excellence,  that  with  aims  so  pure 
and  single,  he  seemed  to  pass  out  of  life  alone,  and, 
as  it  were,  unknown  to  those  who  were  his  contem- 
poraries and  familiars  ? 


414  SAMUEL  HOAR. 

[The  following  sketch  of  Mr.  Hoar  from  a  slightly 
different  point  of  view,  was  prepared  by  Mr.  Em- 
erson, shortly  after  the  above  paper  appeared  in 
"Putnam's  Magazine"  (December,  1856),  at  the 
request  of  the  Editor  of  the  "Monthly  Religious 
Magazine,"  and  was  printed  there,  January,  1857. 
It  is  here  appended  as  giving  some  additional 
traits  of  a  characteristic  figure  which  may  serve  as 
a  pendant  in  some  respects  to  that  of  Dr.  Ripley.] 

Mr.  Hoar  was  distinguished  in  his  profession  by  the 
grasp  of  his  mind,  and  by  the  simplicity  of  his  means. 
His  ability  lay  in  the  clear  apprehension  and  the  power- 
ful statement  of  the  material  points  of  his  case.  He  soon 
possessed  it,  and  he  never  possessed  it  better,  and  he  was 
equally  ready  at  any  moment  to  state  the  facts.  He  saw 
what  was  essential  and  refuted  whatever  was  not,  so  that 
no  man  embarrassed  himself  less  with  a  needless  array 
of  books  and  evidences  of  contingent  value. 

These  tactics  of  the  lawyer  were  the  tactics  of  his  life. 
He  had  uniformly  the  air  of  knowing  just  what  he  wanted 
and  of  going  to  that  in  the  shortest  way.  It  is  singular 
that  his  character  should  make  so  deep  an  impression, 
standing  and  working  as  he  did  on  so  common  a  ground. 
He  was  neither  spiritualist  nor  man  of  genius  nor  of  a 
literary  nor  an  executive  talent.  In  strictness  the  vigor 
of  his  understanding  was  directed  on  the  ordinary  do- 
mestic and  municipal  well-being.  Society  had  reason  to 
cherish  him,  for  he  was  a  main  pillar  on  which  it  leaned. 
The  useful  and  practical  super-abounded  in  his  mind,  and 


SAMUEL  HOAR.  415 

to  a  degree  which  might  be  even  comic  to  young  and 
poetical  persons.  If  he  spoke  of  the  engagement  of  two 
lovers,  he  called  it  a  contract.  Nobody  cared  to  speak 
of  thoughts  or  aspirations  to  a  black-letter  lawyer,  who 
only  studied  to  keep  men  out  of  prison,  and  their  lands 
out  of  attachment.  Had  you  read  Swedenborg  or  Plo- 
tinus  to  him,  he  would  have  waited  till  you  had  done, 
and  answered  you  out  of  the  Revised  Statutes.  He  had 
an  affinity  for  mathematics,  but  it  was  a  taste  rather  than 
a  pursuit,  and  of  the  modern  sciences  he  liked  to  read 
popular  books  on  geology.  Yet  so  entirely  was  this  re- 
spect to  the  ground  plan  and  substructure  of  society  a 
natural  ability,  and  from  the  order  of  his  mind,  and  not 
for  "  tickling  commodity,"  that  it  was  admirable,  as 
every  work  of  nature  is,  and  like  one  of  those  opaque 
crystals,  big  beryls  weighing  tons,  which  are  found  in 
Acworth,  New  Hampshire,  not  less  perfect  in  their  angles 
and  structure,  and  only  less  beautiful,  than  the  transpar- 
ent topazes  and  diamonds.  Meantime,  whilst  his  talent 
and  his  profession  led  him  to  guard  the  material  wealth 
of  society,  a  more  disinterested  person  did  not  exist. 
And  if  there  were  regions  of  knowledge  not  open  to  him, 
he  did  not  pretend  to  them.  His  modesty  was  sincere. 
He  had  a  childlike  innocence  and  a  native  temperance, 
which  left  him  no  temptations,  and  enabled  him  to  meet 
every  comer  with  a  free  and  disengaged  courtesy  that 
had  no  memory  in  it 

"  Of  wrong  and  outrage  with  which  earth  is  filled." 
No  person  was  more  keenly  alive  to  the  stabs  which  the 


416  SAMUEL  HOAR. 

ambition  and  avarice  of  men  inflicted  on  the  common* 
wealth.  Yet  when  politicians  or  speculators  approached 
him,  these  memories  left  no  scar ;  his  countenance  had 
an  unalterable  tranquillity  and  sweetness  ;  he  had  noth- 
ing to  repent  of,  —  let  the  cloud  rest  where  it  might,  he 
dwelt  in  eternal  sunshine. 

He  had  his  birth  and  breeding  in  a  little  country  town, 
where  the  old  religion  existed  in  strictness,  and  spent  all 
his  energy  in  creating  purity  of  manners  and  careful  ed- 
ucation. No  art  or  practice  of  the  farm  was  unknown 
to  him,  and  the  farmers  greeted  him  as  one  of  them- 
selves, whilst  thoy  paid  due  homage  to  his  powers  of 
mind  and  to  his  virtues. 

He  loved  the  dogmas  and  the  simple  usages  of  his 
church;  was  always  an  honored  and  sometimes  an  ac- 
tive member.  He  never  shrunk  from  a  disagreeable 
duty.  In  the  time  of  the  Sunday  laws  he  was  a  tithing- 
man  ;  under  the  Maine  Law  he  was  a  prosecutor  of  the 
liquor  dealers.  It  seemed  as  if  the  New  England  church 
had  formed  him  to  be  its  friend  and  defender  ;  the  lover 
and  assured  friend  of  its  parish  by-laws,  of  its  ministers, 
its  rites,  and  its  social  reforms.  He  was  a  model  of 
those  formal  but  reverend  manners  which  make  what  is 
called  a  gentleman  of  the  old  school,  so  called  under  an 
impression  that  the  style  is  passing  away,  but  which,  I 
suppose,  is  an  optical  illusion,  as  there  are  always  a  few 
more  of  the  class  remaining,  and  always  a  few  young 
men  to  whom  these  manners  are  native. 

I  have  spoken  of  his  modesty ;  he  had  nothing  to  say 
about   himself ;    and  his  sincere  admiration  was   com* 


SAMUEL  HOAR.  417 

manded  by  certain  heroes  of  the  profession,  like  Judge 
Parsons  and  Judge  Marshall,  Mr.  Mason  and  Mr.  Web- 
ster. When  some  one  said,  in  his  presence,  that  Chief 
Justice  Marshall  was  failing  in  his  intellect,  Mr.  Hoar 
remarked  that  "  Judge  Marshall  could  afford  to  lose 
brains  enough  to  furnish  three  or  four  common  men,  be- 
fore common  men  would  find  it  out."  He  had  a  huge  re- 
spect for  Mr.  Webster's  ability,  with  whom  he  had  often 
occasion  to  try  his  strength  at  the  bar,  and  a  proportion- 
ately deep  regret  at  Mr.  Webster's  political  course  in  his 
later  years. 

There  was  no  elegance  in  his  reading  or  tastes  beyond 
the  crystal  clearness  of  his  mind.  He  had  no  love  of 
poetry  ;  and  I  have  heard  that  the  only  verse  that  ha 
was  ever  known  to  quote  was  the  Indian  rule  : 

".When  the  oaks  are  in  the  gray, 
Then,  farmers,  plant  away." 

But  I  find  an  elegance  in  his  quiet  but  firm  withdrawal 
from  all  business  in  the  courts  which  he  could  drop 
without  manifest  detriment  to  the  interests  involved 
(and  this  when  in  his  best  strength),  and  his  self-dedica- 
tion thenceforward  to  unpaid  services  of  the  Temperance 
and  Peace  and  other  philanthropic  societies,  the  Sunday 
Schools,  the  cause  of  Education,  and  specially  of  the 
University,  and  to  such  political  activities  as  a  strong 
sense  of  duty  and  the  love  of  order  and  of  freedom  urged 
him  to  forward.     * 

Perfect  in  his  private  life,  the  husband,  father,  friend, 
he  was  severe  only  with  himself.     He  was  as  if  on  terms 

vol.  x.  27 


418  SAMUEL  HOAR. 

of  honor  with  those  nearest  him,  nor  did  he  think  a  life- 
long familiarity  could  excuse  any  omission  of  courtesy 
from  him.  He  carried  ceremony  finely  to  the  last.  But 
his  heart  was  all  gentleness,  gratitude  and  bounty,, 

With  beams  December  planets  dart, 
His  cold  eye  truth  and  conduct  scanned  % 
July  was  in  his  sunny  heart, 
October  in  his  liberal  hand. 


THOREATL 


A  queen  rejoices  in  her  peers, 
And  wary  Nature  knows  her  own, 
By  court  and  city,  dale  and  down, 
And  like  a  lover  volunteers. 
And  to  her  son  will  treasures  more. 
And  more  to  purpose,  freely  pour 
In  one  wood  walk,  than  learned  men 
Will  find  with  glass  in  ten  times  ten. 


It  seemed  as  if  the  breezes  brought  hini? 
It  seemed  as  if  the  sparrows  taught  himu, 
As  if  by  secret  sign  he  knew 
Where  in  far  fields  the  orchis  grew. 


THOREAU.1 


Heney  David  Thoreau  was  the  last  male  de- 
scendant of  a  French  ancestor  who  came  to  this 
country  from  the  Isle  of  Guernsey.  His  character 
exhibited  occasional  traits  drawn  from  this  blood, 
in  singular  combination  with  a  very  strong  Saxon 
genius. 

He  was  born  in  Concord,  Massachusetts,  on  the 
12th  of  July,  1817.  He  was  graduated  at  Harvard 
College  in  1837,  but  without  any  literary  distinc- 
tion. An  iconoclast  in  literature,  he  seldom  thanked 
colleges  for  their  service  to  him,  holding  them  in 
small  esteem,  whilst  yet  his  debt  to  them  was  impor- 
tant. After  leaving  the  University,  he  joined  his 
brother  in  teaching  a  private  school,  which  he  soon 
renounced.  His  father  was  a  manufacturer  of  lead- 
pencils,  and  Henry  applied  himself  for  a  time  to  this 
craft,  believing  he  could  make  a  better  pencil  than 

1  Part  of  this  paper  was  the  Address  delivered  by  Mr. 
Emerson  at  the  funeral  of  Mr.  Thoreau,  in  May,  1862.  In 
the  following  summer  it  was  enlarged  and  printed  in  the 
"  Atlantic  Monthly  "  in  its  present  form. 


422  THOREAU. 

was  then  in  use.  After  completing  his  experiments, 
he  exhibited  his  work  to  chemists  and  artists  in 
Boston,  and  having  obtained  their  certificates  to  its 
excellence  and  to  its  equality  with  the  best  Lon- 
don manufacture,  he  returned  home  contented.  His 
friends  congratulated  him  that  he  had  now  opened 
his  way  to  fortune.  But  he  replied,  that  he  should 
never  make  another  pencil.  "  Why  should  I  ?  I 
would  not  do  again  what  I  have  done  once."  He  re- 
sumed his  endless  walks  and  miscellaneous  studies, 
making  every  day  some  new  acquaintance  with 
Nature,  though  as  yet  never  speaking  of  zoology  or 
botany,  since,  though  very  studious  of  natural  facts, 
he  was  incurious  of  technical  and  textual  science. 

At  this  time,  a  strong,  healthy  youth,  fresh  from 
college,  whilst  all  his  companions  were  choosing 
their  profession,  or  eager  to  begin  some  lucrative 
employment,  it  was  inevitable  that  his  thoughts 
should  be  exercised  on  the  same  question,  and  it  re- 
quired rare  decision  to  refuse  all  the  accustomed 
paths  and  keep  his  solitary  freedom  at  the  cost  of 
disappointing  the  natural  expectations  of  his  family 
and  friends  :  all  the  more  difficult  that  he  had  a 
perfect  probity,  was  exact  in  securing  his  own  inde- 
pendence, and  in  holding  every  man  to  the  like 
duty.  But  Thoreau  never  faltered.  He  was  a 
born  protestant.  He  declined  to  give  up  his  large 
ambition  of  knowledge  and  action  for  any  narrow 


THOREAU.  423 

craft  or  profession,  aiming  at  a  much  more  com- 
prehensive calling,  the  art  of  living  well.  If  he 
slighted  and  defied  the  opinions  of  others,  it  was 
only  that  he  was  more  intent  to  reconcile  his  prac- 
tice with  his  own  belief.  Never  idle  or  self-indul- 
gent, he  preferred,  when  he  wanted  money,  earning 
it  by  some  piece  of  manual  labor  agreeable  to  him, 
as  building  a  boat  or  a  fence,  planting,  grafting, 
surveying,  or  other  short  work,  to  any  long  engage- 
ments. With  his  hardy  habits  and  few  wants,  his 
skill  in  wood-craft,  and  his  powerful  arithmetic,  he 
was  very  competent  to  live  in  any  part  of  the  world. 
It  would  cost  him  less  time  to  supply  his  wants 
than  another.  He  was  therefore  secure  of  his  lei- 
sure. 

A  natural  skill  for  mensuration,  growing  out  of 
his  mathematical  knowledge  and  his  habit  of  ascer- 
taining the  measures  and  distances  of  objects  which 
interested  him,  the  size  of  trees,  the  depth  and  extent 
of  ponds  and  rivers,  the  height  of  mountains,  and 
the  air-line  distance  of  his  favorite  summits,  —  this, 
and  his  intimate  knowledge  of  the  territory  about 
Concord,  made  him  drift  into  the  profession  of 
land-surveyor.  It  had  the  advantage  for  him  that 
it  led  him  continually  into  new  and  secluded 
grounds,  and  helped  his  studies  of  Nature.  His 
accuracy  and  skill  in  this  work  were  readily  appre- 
ciated, and  he  found  all  the  employment  he  wanted 


424  THOREAU. 

He  could  easily  solve  the  problems  of  the  sur- 
veyor, but  he  was  daily  beset  with  graver  questions, 
which  he  manfully  confronted.  He  interrogated 
every  custom,  and  wished  to  settle  all  his  practice 
on  an  ideal  foundation.  He  was  a  protestant  a 
outrance,  and  few  lives  contain  so  many  renuncia- 
tions. He  was  bred  to  no  profession;  he  never 
married ;  he  lived  alone ;  he  never  went  to  church ; 
he  never  voted ;  he  refused  to  pay  a  tax  to  the 
State;  he  ate  no  flesh,  he  drank  no  wine,  he  never 
knew  the  use  of  tobacco  ;  and,  though  a  naturalist, 
he  used  neither  trap  nor  gun.  He  chose,  wisely  no 
doubt  for  himself,  to  be  the  bachelor  of  thought 
and  Nature.  He  had  no  talent  for  wealth,  and 
knew  how  to  be  poor  without  the  least  hint  of 
squalor  or  inelegance.  Perhaps  he  fell  into  his 
way  of  living  without  forecasting  it  much,  but  ap- 
proved it  with  later  wisdom.  "  I  am  often  re- 
minded," he  wrote  in  his  journal,  "  that  if  I  had 
bestowed  on  me  the  wealth  of  Croesus,  my  aims 
must  be  still  the  same,  and  my  means  essentially 
the  same."  He  had  no  temptations  to  fight  against, 
—  no  appetites,  no  passions,  no  taste  for  elegant 
trifles.  A  fine  house,  dress,  the  manners  and  talk 
of  highly  cultivated  people  were  all  thrown  away  on 
him.  He  much  preferred  a  good  Indian,  and  con- 
sidered these  refinements  as  impediments  to  conver- 
sation, wishing  to  meet  his  companion  on  the  sim- 


THOREAU.  425 

plest  terms.  He  declined  invitations  to  dinner-par- 
ties, because  there  each  was  in  every  one's  way,  and 
he  could  not  meet  the  individuals  to  any  purpose. 
"  They  make  their  pride,"  he  said,  "  in  making 
their  dinner  cost  much  ;  I  make  my  pride  in  mak- 
ing my  dinner  cost  little."  When  asked  at  table 
what  dish  he  preferred,  he  answered,  "  The  near- 
est." He  did  not  like  the  taste  of  wine,  and  never 
had  a  vice  in  his  life.  He  said,  —  "I  have  a  faint 
recollection  of  pleasure  derived  from  smoking  dried 
lily-stems,  before  I  was  a  man.  I  had  commonly  a 
supply  of  these.  I  have  never  smoked  anything 
more  noxious." 

He  chose  to  be  rich  by  making  his  wants  few, 
and  supplying  them  himself.  In  his  travels,  he 
used  the  railroad  only  to  get  over  so  much,  country 
as  was  unimportant  to  the  present  purpose,  walking 
hundreds  of  miles,  avoiding  taverns,  buying  a  lodg- 
ing in  farmers'  and  fishermen's  houses,  as  cheaper, 
and  more  agreeable  to  him,  and  because  there  he 
could  better  find  the  men  and  the  information  he 
wanted. 

There  was  somewhat  military  in  his  nature,  not 
to  be  subdued,  always  manly  and  able,  but  rarely 
tender,  as  if  he  did  not  feel  himself  except  in  oppo- 
sition. He  wanted  a  fallacy  to  expose,  a  blunder 
to  pillory,  I  may  say  required  a  little  sense  of  vic- 
tory, a  roll  of  the  drum,  to  call  his  powers  into  full 


426  THOREAU. 

exercise.  It  cost  him  nothing  to  say  No ;  indeed 
he  found  it  much  easier  than  to  say  Yes.  It  seemed 
as  if  his  first  instinct  on  hearing  a  proposition  was 
to  controvert  it,  so  impatient  was  he  of  the  limita- 
tions of  our  daily  thought.  This  habit,  of  course, 
is  a  little  chilling  to  the  social  affections ;  and 
though  the  companion  would  in  the  end  acquit  him 
of  any  malice  or  untruth,  yet  it  mars  conversation. 
Hence,  no  equal  companion  stood  in  affectionate  re- 
lations with  one  so  pure  and  guileless.  "  I  love 
Henry,"  said  one  of  his  friends,  "  but  I  cannot  like 
him  ;  and  as  for  taking  his  arm,  I  should  as  soon 
think  of  taking  the  arm  of  an  elm- tree." 

Yet,  hermit  and  stoic  as  he  was,  he  was  really 
fond  of  sympathy,  and  threw  himself  heartily  and 
childlike  into  the  company  of  young  people  whom 
he  loved,  and  whom  he  delighted  to  entertain,  as  he 
only  could,  with  the  varied  and  endless  anecdotes 
of  his  experiences  by  field  and  river :  and  he  was 
always  ready  to  lead  a  huckleberry-party  or  a 
search  for  chestnuts  or  grapes.  Talking,  one  day, 
of  a  public  discourse,  Henry  remarked,  that  what- 
ever succeeded  with  the  audience  was  bad.  I  said, 
"  Who  would  not  like  to  write  something  which  all 
can  read,  like  Robinson  Crusoe  ?  and  who  does  not 
see  with  regret  that  his  page  is  not  solid  with  a 
right  materialistic  treatment,  which  delights  every- 
body ?  "     Henry  objected,  of  course,  and  vaunted 


THOREAU.  427 

the  better  lectures  which  reached  only  a  few  persons. 
But,  at  supper,  a  young  girl,  understanding  that  he 
was  to  lecture  at  the  Lyceum,  sharply  asked  him, 
"  Whether  his  lecture  would  be  a  nice,  interesting 
story,  such  as  she  wished  to  hear,  or  whether  it  was 
one  of  those  old  philosophical  things  that  she  did 
not  care  about."  Henry  turned  to  her,  and  be- 
thought himself,  and,  I  saw,  was  trying  to  believe 
that  he  had  matter  that  might  fit  her  and  her 
brother,  who  were  to  sit  up  and  go  to  the  lecture, 
if  it  was  a  good  one  for  them. 

He  was  a  speaker  and  actor  of  the  truth,  born 
such,  and  was  ever  running  into  dramatic  situations 
from  this  cause.  In  any  circumstance  it  interested 
all  bystanders  to  know  what  part  Henry  would  take, 
and  what  he  would  say  ;  and  he  did  not  disappoint 
expectation,  but  used  an  original  judgment  on  each 
emergency.  In  1845  he  built  himself  a  small 
framed  house  on  the  shores  of  Walden  Pond,  and 
lived  there  two  years  alone,  a  life  of  labor  and  study. 
This  action  was  quite  native  and  fit  for  him.  No 
one  who  knew  him  would  tax  him  with  affectation. 
He  was  more  unlike  his  neighbors  in  his  thought 
than  in  his  action.  As  soon  as  he  had  exhausted 
the  advantages  of  that  solitude,  he  abandoned  it. 
In  1847,  not  approving  some  uses  to  which  the  pub- 
lic expenditure  was  applied,  he  refused  to  pay  his 
town  tax,  and  was  put  in  jaiL     A  friend  paid  the 


428  THOREAU. 

tax  for  him,  and  he  was  released.  The  like  annoy- 
ance was  threatened  the  next  year.  But,  as  his 
friends  paid  the  tax,  notwithstanding  his  protest,  I 
believe  he  ceased  to  resist.  No  opposition  or  ridi- 
cule had  any  weight  with  him.  He  coldly  and  fully 
stated  his  opinion  without  affecting  to  believe  that 
it  was  the  opinion  of  the  company.  It  was  of  no 
consequence  if  every  one  present  held  the  opposite 
opinion.  On  one  occasion  he  went  to  the  Univer- 
sity Library  to  procure  some  books.  The  librarian 
refused  to  lend  them.  Mr.  Thoreau  repaired  to 
the  President,  who  stated  to  him  the  rules  and 
usages,  which  permitted  the  loan  of  books  to  resi- 
dent graduates,  to  clergymen  who  were  alumni,  and 
to  some  others  resident  within  a  circle  of  ten  miles' 
radius  from  the  College.  Mr.  Thoreau  explained 
to  the  President  that  the  railroad  had  destroyed 
the  old  scale  of  distances,  —  that  the  library  was 
useless,  yes,  and  President  and  College  useless,  on 
the  terms  of  his  rules,  —  that  the  one  benefit  he 
owed  to  the  College  was  its  library, —  that,  at  this 
moment,  not  only  his  want  of  books  was  imperative 
but  he  wanted  a  large  number  of  books,  and  as- 
sured him  that  he,  Thoreau,  and  not  the  librarian, 
was  the  proper  custodian  of  these.  In  short,  the 
President  found  the  petitioner  so  formidable,  and 
the  rules  getting  to  look  so  ridiculous,  that  he  ended 
by  giving  him  a  privilege  which  in  his  hands  proved 
unlimited  thereafter. 


THOREAU.  429 

No  truer  American  existed  than  Thoreau.  His 
preference  of  his  country  and  condition  was  genuine, 
and  his  aversation  from  English  and  European 
manners  and  tastes  almost  reached  contempt.  He 
listened  impatiently  to  news  or  bonmots  gleaned 
from  London  circles ;  and  though  he  tried  to  be 
civil,  these  anecdotes  fatigued  him.  The  men  were 
all  imitating  each  other,  and  on  a  small  mould. 
Why  can  they  not  live  as  far  apart  as  possible,  and 
each  be  a  man  by  himself  ?  What  he  sought  was 
the  most  energetic  nature ;  and  he  wished  to  go  to 
Oregon,  not  to  London.  "  In  every  part  of  Great 
Britain,"  he  wrote  in  his  diary,  "  are  discovered 
traces  of  the  Romans,  their  funereal  urns,  their 
camps,  their  roads,  their  dwellings.  But  New  Eng- 
land, at  least,  is  not  based  on  any  Roman  ruins. 
We  have  not  to  lay  the  foundations  of  our  houses 
on  the  ashes  of  a  former  civilization." 

But,  idealist  as  he  was,  standing  for  abolition  of 
slavery,  abolition  of  tariffs,  almost  for  abolition  of 
government,  it  is  needless  to  say  he  found  himself 
not  only  unrepresented  in  actual  politics,  but  almost 
equally  opposed  to  every  class  of  reformers.  Yet 
he  paid  the  tribute  of  his  uniform  respect  to  the 
Anti-Slavery  party.  One  man,  whose  personal  ac- 
quaintance he  had  formed,  he  honored  with  excep- 
tional regard.  Before  the  first  friendly  word  had 
been  spoken  for  Captain  John  Brown,  he  sent  no- 


430  THOREAU. 

tices  to  most  houses  in  Concord  that  he  would  speak 
in  a  public  hall  on  the  condition  and  character  of 
John  Brown,  on  Sunday  evening,  and  invited  all 
people  to  come.  The  Republican  Committee,  the 
Abolitionist  Committee,  sent  him  word  that  it  was 
premature  and  not  advisable.  He  replied,  —  "I 
did  not  send  to  you  for  advice,  but  to  announce 
that  I  am  to  speak."  The  hall  was  filled  at  an 
early  hour  by  people  of  all  parties,  and  his  earnest 
eulogy  of  the  hero  was  heard  by  all  respectfully,  by 
many  with  a  sympathy  that  surprised  themselves. 

It  was  said  of  Plotinus  that  he  was  ashamed  of 
his  body,  and  't  is  very  likely  he  had  good  reason 
for  it,  —  that  his  body  was  a  bad  servant,  and  he 
had  not  skill  in  dealing  with  the  material  world,  as 
happens  often  to  men  of  abstract  intellect.  But 
Mr.  Thoreau  was  equipped  with  a  most  adapted 
and  serviceable  body.  He  was  of  short  stature, 
firmly  built,  of  light  complexion,  with  strong,  seri- 
ous blue  eyes,  and  a  grave  aspect,  —  his  face  cov- 
ered in  the  late  years  with  a  becoming  beard.  His 
senses  were  acute,  his  frame  well-knit  and  hardy, 
his  hands  strong  and  skilful  in  the  use  of  tools. 
And  there  was  a  wonderful  fitness  of  body  and 
mind.  He  could  pace  sixteen  rods  more  accurately 
than  another  man  could  measure  them  with  rod  and 
chain.  He  could  find  his  path  in  the  woods  at  night, 
he  said,  better  by  his  feet  than  his  eyes.    He  could 


THOREAU,  431 

estimate  the  measure  of  a  tree  very  well  by  his  eye  ; 
he  could  estimate  the  weight  of  a  calf  or  a  pig,  like 
a  dealer.  From  a  box  containing  a  bushel  or  more 
of  loose  pencils,  he  could  take  up  with  his  hands 
fast  enough  just  a  dozen  pencils  at  every  grasp. 
He  was  a  good  swimmer,  runner,  skater,  boatman, 
and  would  probably  outwalk  most  countrymen  in  a 
day's  journey.  And  the  relation  of  body  to  mind 
was  still  finer  than  we  have  indicated.  He  said  he 
wanted  every  stride  his  legs  made.  The  length  of 
his  walk  uniformly  made  the  length  of  his  writing. 
If  shut  up  in  the  house  he  did  not  write  at  all. 

He  had  a  strong  common-sense,  like  that  which 
Kose  Flammock  the  weaver's  daughter  in  Scott's 
romance  commends  in  her  father,  as  resembling  a 
yardstick,  which,  whilst  it  measures  dowlas  and 
diaper,  can  equally  well  measure  tapestry  and  cloth 
of  gold.  He  had  always  a  new  resource.  When 
I  was  planting  forest  trees,  and  had  procured  half 
a  peck  of  acorns,  he  said  that  only  a  small  portion 
of  them  would  be  sound,  and  proceeded  to  examine 
them  and  select  the  sound  ones.  But  finding  this 
took  time,  he  said,  "  I  think  if  you  put  them  all 
into  water  the  good  ones  will  sink;  "  which  experi- 
ment we  tried  with  success.  He  could  plan  a  gar- 
den or  a  house  or  a  barn ;  would  have  been  com- 
petent to  lead  a  "  Pacific  Exploring  Expedition  ;  " 
could  give  judicious  counsel  in  the  gravest  private 
or  public  affairs. 


432  THOREAU. 

He  lived  for  the  day,  not  cumbered  and  mortified 
by  his  memory.  If  he  brought  you  yesterday  a  new 
proposition,  he  would  bring  you  to-day  another  not 
less  revolutionary.  A  very  industrious  man,  and 
setting,  like  all  highly  organized  men,  a  high  value 
on  his  time,  he  seemed  the  only  man  of  leisure  in 
town,  always  ready  for  any  excursion  that  promised 
well,  or  for  conversation  prolonged  into  late  hours. 
His  trenchant  sense  was  never  stopped  by  his  rules 
of  daily  prudence,  but  was  always  up  to  the  new  oc- 
casion. He  liked  and  used  the  simplest  food,  yet, 
when  some  one  urged  a  vegetable  diet,  Thoreau 
thought  all  diets  a  very  small  matter,  saying  that 
"  the  man  who  shoots  the  buffalo  lives  better  than 
the  man  who  boards  at  the  Graham  House."  He 
said,  —  "  You  can  sleep  near  the  railroad,  and  never 
be  disturbed :  Nature  knows  very  well  what  sounds 
are  worth  attending  to,  and  has  made  up  her  mind 
not  to  hear  the  railroad-whistle.  But  things  re- 
spect the  devout  mind,  and  a  mental  ecstacy  was 
never  interrupted."  He  noted  what  repeatedly  be- 
fell him,  that,  after  receiving  from  a  distance  a 
rare  plant,  he  would  presently  find  the  same  in  his 
own  haunts.  And  those  pieces  of  luck  which  hap- 
pen only  to  good  players  happened  to  him.  One 
day,  walking  with  a  stranger,  who  inquired  where 
Indian  arrow-heads  could  be  found,  he  replied, 
"  Everywhere,"  and,  stooping  forward,  picked  one 


THOREAU.  433 

on  the  instant  from  the  ground.  At  Mount  Wash- 
ington, in  Tuckerman's  Ravine,  Thoreau  had  a  bad 
fall,  and  sprained  his  foot.  As  he  was  in  the  act 
of  getting  up  from  his  fall,  he  saw  for  the  first  time 
the  leaves  of  the  Arnica  mollis. 

His  robust  common  sense,  armed  with  stout  hands, 
keen  perceptions  and  strong  will,  cannot  yet  account 
for  the  superiority  which  shone  in  his  simple  and 
hidden  life.  I  must  add  the  cardinal  fact,  that 
there  was  an  excellent  wisdom  in  him,  proper  to  a 
rare  class  of  men,  which  showed  him  the  material 
world  as  a  means  and  symbol.  This  discovery, 
which  sometimes  yields  to  poets  a  certain  casual 
and  interrupted  light,  serving  for  the  ornament  of 
their  writing,  was  in  him  an  unsleeping  insight; 
and  whatever  faults  or  obstructions  of  temperament 
might  cloud  it,  he  was  not  disobedient  to  the  heav- 
enly vision.  In  his  youth,  he  said,  one  day,  "  The 
other  world  is  all  my  art ;  my  pencils  will  draw  no 
other  ;  my  jack-knife  will  cut  nothing  else  ;  I  do  not 
use  it  as  a  means."  This  was  the  muse  and  genius 
that  ruled  his  opinions,  conversation,  studies,  work 
and  course  of  life.  This  made  him  a  searching 
judge  of  men.  At  first  glance  he  measured  his 
companion,  and,  though  insensible  to  some  fine 
traits  of  culture,  could  very  well  report  his  weight 
and  calibre.  And  this  made  the  impression  of  gen- 
ius which  his  conversation  sometimes  gave. 


434  THOREAU. 

He  understood  the  matter  in  hand  at  a  glance, 
and  saw  the  limitations  and  poverty  of  those  he 
talked  with,  so  that  nothing  seemed  concealed  from 
such  terrible  eyes.  I  have  repeatedly  known  young 
men  of  sensibility  converted  in  a  moment  to  the  be- 
lief that  this  was  the  man  they  were  in  search  of, 
the  man  of  men,  who  could  tell  them  all  they 
should  do.  His  own  dealing  with  them  was  never 
affectionate,  but  superior,  didactic,  scorning  their 
petty  ways,  —  very  slowly  conceding,  or  not  conced- 
ing at  all,  the  promise  of  his  society  at  their  houses, 
or  even  at  his  own.  "  Would  he  not  walk  with 
them  ?  "  "  He  did  not  know.  There  was  nothing 
so  important  to  him  as  his  walk  ;  he  had  no  walks 
to  throw  away  on  company."  Visits  were  offered 
him  from  respectful  parties,  but  he  declined  them. 
Admiring  friends  offered  to  carry  him  at  their  own 
cost  to  the  Yellowstone  River,  —  to  the  West  Indies, 
—  to  South  America.  But  though  nothing  could 
be  more  grave  or  considered  than  his  refusals, 
they  remind  one,  in  quite  new  relations,  of  that  fop 
Brummel's  reply  to  the  gentleman  who  offered  him 
his  carriage  in  a  shower,  "  But  where  will  you  ride, 
then?" — and  what  accusing  silences,  and  what 
searching  and  irresistible  speeches,  battering  down 
all  defenses,  his  companions  can  remember ! 

Mr.  Thoreau  dedicated  his  genius  with  such  en- 
tire love  to  the  fields,  hills  and  waters  of  his  native 


THOREAU.  435 

town,  that  he  made  them  known  and  interesting  to 
all  reading  Americans,  and  to  people  over  the  sea. 
The  river  on  whose  banks  he  was  born  and  died  he 
knew  from  its  springs  to  its  confluence  with  the 
Merrimack.  He  had  made  summer  and  winter  ob- 
servations on  it  for  many  years,  and  at  every  hour 
of  the  day  and  night.  The  result  of  the  recent  sur- 
vey of  the  Water  Commissioners  appointed  by  the 
State  of  Massachusetts  he  had  reached  by  his  pri- 
vate experiments,  several  years  earlier.  Every  fact 
which  occurs  in  the  bed,  on  the  banks,  or  in  the  air 
over  it;  the  fishes,  and  their  spawning  and  nests, 
their  manners,  their  food ;  the  shad-flies  which  fill 
the  air  on  a  certain  evening  once  a  year,  and  which 
are  snapped  at  by  the  fishes  so  ravenously  that  many 
of  these  die  of  repletion  ;  the  conical  heaps  of  small 
stones  on  the  river-shallows,  the  huge  nests  of  small 
fishes,  one  of  which  will  sometimes  overfill  a  cart ; 
the  birds  which  frequent  the  stream,  heron,  duck, 
sheldrake,  loon,  osprey ;  the  snake,  muskrat,  otter, 
woodchuck  and  fox,  on  the  banks ;  the  turtle,  frog, 
hyla  and  cricket,  which  make  the  banks  vocal, — 
were  all  known  to  him,  and,  as  it  were,  townsmen 
and  fellow-creatures  ;  so  that  he  felt  an  absurdity 
or  violence  in  any  narrative  of  one  of  these  by  itself 
apart,  and  still  more  of  its  dimensions  on  an  inch- 
rule,  or  in  the  exhibition  of  its  skeleton,  or  the 
specimen  of  a  squirrel  or  a  bird  in  brandy o     He 


436  THOREAU. 

liked  to  speak  of  the  manners  of  the  river,  as  itself 
a  lawful  creature,  yet  with  exactness,  and  always  to 
an  observed  fact.  As  he  knew  the  river,  so  the 
ponds  in  this  region. 

One  of  the  weapons  he  used,  more  important  to 
him  than  microscope  or  alcohol-receiver  to  other  in- 
vestigators, was  a  whim  which  grew  on  him  by  in- 
dulgence, yet  appeared  in  gravest  statement,  namely, 
of  extolling  his  own  town  and  neighborhood  as  the 
most  favored  centre  for  natural  observation.  He 
remarked  that  the  Flora  of  Massachusetts  embraced 
almost  all  the  important  plants  of  America,  —  most 
of  the  oaks,  most  of  the  willows,  the  best  pines,  the 
ash,  the  maple,  the  beech,  the  nuts.  He  returned 
Kane's  "  Arctic  Voyage  "  to  a  friend  of  whom  he 
had  borrowed  it,  with  the  remark,  that  "  Most  of 
the  phenomena  noted  might  be  observed  in  Con- 
cord." He  seemed  a  little  envious  of  the  Pole,  for 
the  coincident  sunrise  and  sunset,  or  five  minutes' 
day  after  six  months :  a  splendid  fact,  which  An- 
nursnuc  had  never  afforded  him.  He  found  red 
snow  in  one  of  his  walks,  and  told  me  that  he  ex- 
pected to  find  yet  the  Victoria  regia  in  Concord. 
He  was  the  attorney  of  the  indigenous  plants,  and 
owned  to  a  preference  of  the  weeds  to  the  imported 
plants  as  of  the  Indian  to  the  civilized  man,  and 
noticed,  with  pleasure,  that  the  willow  bean-poles 
of  his  neighbor  had  grown  more  than  his  beans, 


THOREAU.  437 

"  See  these  weeds,"  he  said,  "  which  have  been  hoed 
at  by  a  million  farmers  all  spring  and  summer,  and 
yet  have  prevailed,  and  just  now  come  out  trium- 
phant over  all  lanes,  pastures,  fields  and  gardens, 
such  is  their  vigor.  We  have  insulted  them  with 
low  names,  too,  —  as  Pigweed,  Wormwood,  Chick- 
weed,  Shad-blossom."  He  says,  "They have  brave 
names,  too,  —  Ambrosia,  Stellaria,  Amelanchier, 
Amaranth,  etc." 

I  think  his  fancy  for  referring  everything  to  the 
meridian  of  Concord  did  not  grow  out  of  any  ig- 
norance or  depreciation  of  other  longitudes  or  lati- 
tudes, but  was  rather  a  playful  expression  of  his 
conviction  of  the  indifferency  of  all  places,  and  that 
the  best  place  for  each  is  where  he  stands.  He 
expressed  it  once  in  this  wise  :  —  "I  think  nothing 
is  to  be  hoped  from  you,  if  this  bit  of  mould  under 
your  feet  is  not  sweeter  to  you  to  eat  than  any  other 
in  this  world,  or  in  any  world." 

The  other  weapon  with  which  he  conquered  all 
obstacles  in  science  was  patience.  He  knew  how 
to  sit  immovable,  a  part  of  the  rock  he  rested  on, 
until  the  bird,  the  reptile,  the  fish,  which  had  re- 
tired from  him,  should  come  back  and  resume  its 
habits,  nay,  moved  by  curiosity,  should  come  to  him 
and  watch  him. 

It  was  a  pleasure  and  a  privilege  to  walk  with 
him.     He  knew  the  country  like  a  fox  or  a  bird, 


438  TEOREAU. 

and  passed  through  it  as  freely  by  paths  of  his  own. 
He  knew  every  track  in  the  snow  or  on  the  ground, 
and  what  creature  had  taken  this  path  before  him. 
One  must  submit  abjectly  to  such  a  guide,  and  the 
reward  was  great.  Under  his  arm  he  carried  an 
old  music-book  to  press  plants ;  in  his  pocket,  his 
diary  and  pencil,  a  spy-glass  for  birds,  microscope, 
jack-knife,  and  twine.  He  wore  a  straw  hat,  stout 
shoes,  strong  gray  trousers,  to  brave  scrub-oaks  and 
smilax,  and  to  climb  a  tree  for  a  hawk's  or  a  squir- 
rel's nest.  He  waded  into  the  pool  for  the  water- 
plants,  and  his  strong  legs  were  no  insignificant 
part  of  his  armor.  On  the  day  I  speak  of  he  looked 
for  the  Menyanthes,  detected  it  across  the  wide 
pool,  and,  on  examination  of  the  florets,  decided 
that  it  had  been  in  flower  five  days.  He  drew  out 
of  his  breast-pocket  his  diary,  and  read  the  names 
of  all  the  plants  that  should  bloom  on  this  day, 
whereof  he  kept  account  as  a  banker  when  his  notes 
fall  due.  The  Cypripedium  not  due  till  to-morrow. 
He  thought  that,  if  waked  up  from  a  trance,  in 
this  swamp,  he  could  tell  by  the  plants  what  time 
of  the  year  it  was  within  two  days.  The  redstart 
was  flying  about,  and  presently  the  fine  grosbeaks, 
whose  brilliant  scarlet  "  makes  the  rash  gazer  wipe 
his  eye,"  and  whose  fine  clear  note  Thoreau  com- 
pared to  that  of  a  tanager  which  has  got  rid  of  its 
hoarseness.     Presently  he  heard  a  note  which  he 


THOREAU.  439 

called  that  of  the  night-warbler,  a  bird  he  had 
never  identified,  had  been  in  search  of  twelve  years, 
which  always,  when  he  saw  it,  was  in  the  act  of 
diving  down  into  a  tree  or  bush,  and  which  it  was 
vain  to  seek ;  the  only  bird  which  sings  indiffer- 
ently by  night  and  by  day.  I  told  him  he  must 
beware  of  finding  and  booking  it,  lest  life  should 
have  nothing  more  to  show  him.  He  said,  "  What 
you  seek  in  vain  for,  half  your  life,  one  day  you 
come  full  upon,  all  the  family  at  dinner.  You 
seek  it  like  a  dream,  and  as  soon  as  you  find  it  you 
become  its  prey." 

His  interest  in  the  flower  or  the  bird  lay  very 
deep  in  his  mind,  was  connected  with  Nature,  —  and 
the  meaning  of  Nature  was  never  attempted  to  be 
defined  by  him.  He  would  not  offer  a  memoir  of  his 
observations  to  the  Natural  History  Society.  "  Why 
should  I  ?  To  detach  the  description  from  its  con- 
nections in  my  mind  would  make  it  no  longer  true 
or  valuable  to  me :  and  they  do  not  wish  what  be- 
longs to  it."  His  power  of  observation  seemed  to 
indicate  additional  senses.  He  saw  as  with  micro- 
scope, heard  as  with  ear-trumpet,  and  his  memory 
was  a  photographic  register  of  all  he  saw  and 
heard.  And  yet  none  knew  better  than  he  that  it 
is  not  the  fact  that  imports,  but  the  impression  or 
effect  of  the  fact  on  your  mind.  Every  fact  lay  in 
glory  in  his  mind,  a  type  of  the  order  and  beauty 
of  the  whole. 


440  THOREAU. 

His  determination  on  Natural  History  was  or- 
ganic. He  confessed  that  he  sometimes  felt  like  a 
hound  or  a  panther,  and,  if  born  among  Indians, 
would  have  been  a  fell  hunter.  But,  restrained  by 
his  Massachusetts  culture,  he  played  out  the  game 
in  this  mild  form  of  botany  and  ichthyology.  His 
intimacy  with  animals  suggested  what  Thomas  Ful- 
ler records  of  Butler  the  apiologist,  that  "  either  he 
had  told  the  bees  things  or  the  bees  had  told  him." 
Snakes  coiled  round  his  leg ;  the  fishes  swam  into 
his  hand,  and  he  took  them  out  of  the  water ;  he 
pulled  the  woodchuck  out  of  its  hole  by  the  tail 
and  took  the  foxes  under  his  protection  from  the 
hunters.  Our  naturalist  had  perfect  magnanimity ; 
he  had  no  secrets  :  he  would  carry  you  to  the  her- 
on's haunt,  or  even  to  his  most  prized  botanical 
swamp,  —  possibly  knowing  that  you  could  never 
find  it  again,  yet  willing  to  take  his  risks. 

No  college  ever  offered  him  a  diploma,  or  a  pro- 
fessor's chair ;  no  academy  made  him  its  corre- 
sponding secretary,  its  discoverer,  or  even  its  mem- 
ber. Perhaps  these  learned  bodies  feared  the  sat- 
ire of  his  presence.  Yet  so  much  knowledge  of 
Nature's  secret  and  genius  few  others  possessed; 
none  in  a  more  large  and  religious  synthesis.  For 
not  a  particle  of  respect  had  he  to  the  opinions  of 
any  man  or  body  of  men,  but  homage  solely  to  the 
truth   itself  ;    and   as   he    discovered    everywhere 


THOREAU.  441 

Among  doctors  some  leaning  of  courtesy,  it  dis- 
credited them.  He  grew  to  be  revered  and  ad- 
mired by  bis  townsmen,  who  had  at  first  known 
him  only  as  an  oddity.  The  farmers  who  employed 
him  as  a  surveyor  soon  discovered  his  rare  accu- 
racy and  skill,  his  knowledge  of  their  lands,  of 
trees,  of  birds,  of  Indian  remains  and  the  like, 
which  enabled  him  to  tell  every  farmer  more  than 
he  knew  before  of  his  own  farm ;  so  that  he  began 
to  feel  a  little  as  if  Mr.  Thoreau  had  better  rights 
in  his  land  than  he.  They  felt,  too,  the  superiority 
of  character  which  addressed  all  men  with  a  native 
authority. 

Indian  relics  abound  in  Concord,  —  arrow-heads, 
stone  chisels,  pestles,  and  fragments  of  pottery; 
and  on  the  river-bank,  large  heaps  of  clam-shells 
and  ashes  mark  spots  which  the  savages  frequented. 
These,  and  every  circumstance  touching  the  In- 
dian, were  important  in  his  eyes.  His  visits  to 
Maine  were  chiefly  for  love  of  the  Indian.  He  had' 
the  satisfaction  of  seeing  the  manufacture  of  the 
bark-canoe,  as  well  as  of  trying  his  hand  in  its  man- 
agement on  the  rapids.  He  was  inquisitive  about 
the  making  of  the  stone  arrow-head,  and  in  his  last 
days  charged  a  youth  setting  out  for  the  Rocky 
Mountains  to  find  an  Indian  who  could  tell  him 
that :  "It  was  well  worth  a  visit  to  California  to 
learn  it."     Occasionally,  a  small  party  of  Penob* 


442  TEOREAU. 

scot  Indians  would  visit  Concord,  and  pitch  their 
tents  for  a  few  weeks  in  summer  on  the  river-bank. 
He  failed  not  to  make  acquaintance  with  the  best 
of  them ;  though  he  well  knew  that  asking  ques- 
tions of  Indians  is  like  catechizing  beavers  and  rab- 
bits. In  his  last  visit  to  Maine  he  had  great  satis- 
faction from  Joseph  Polis,  an  intelligent  Indian  of 
Oldtown,  who  was  his  guide  for  some  weeks. 

He  was  equally  interested  in  every  natural  fact. 
The  depth  of  his  perception  found  likeness  of  law 
throughout  Nature,  and  I  know  not  any  genius  who 
so  swiftly  inferred  universal  law  from  the  single 
fact.  He  was  no  pedant  of  a  department.  His 
eye  was  open  to  beauty,  and  his  ear  to  music.  He 
found  these,  not  in  rare  conditions,  but  wheresoever 
he  went.  He  thought  the  best  of  music  was  in  sin- 
gle strains ;  and  he  found  poetic  suggestion  in  the 
humming  of  the  telegraph-wire. 

His  poetry  might  be  bad  or  good ;  he  no  doubt 
wanted  a  lyric  facility  and  technical  skill,  but  he 
had  the  source  of  poetry  in  his  spiritual  perception. 
He  was  a  good  reader  and  critic,  and  his  judgment 
on  poetry  was  to  the  ground  of  it.  He  could  not 
be  deceived  as  to  the  presence  or  absence  of  the 
poetic  element  in  any  composition,  and  his  thirst 
for  this  made  him  negligent  and  perhaps  scornful 
of  superficial  graces.  He  would  pass  by  many  del 
icate  rhythms,  but  he  would  have  detected  every 


THOREAU.  443 

live  stanza  or  line  in  a  volume,  and  knew  very  well 
where  to  find  an  equal  poetic  charm  in  prose.  He 
was  so  enamored  of  the  spiritual  beauty  that  he 
held  all  actual  written  poems  in  very  light  esteem 
in  the  comparison.  He  admired  iEschylus  and 
Pindar ;  but,  when  some  one  was  commending  them, 
he  said  that  iEschylus  and  the  Greeks,  in  describ- 
ing Apollo  and  Orpheus,  had  given  no  song,  or  no 
good  one.  "  They  ought  not  to  have  moved  trees, 
but  to  have  chanted  to  the  gods  such  a  hymn  as 
would  have  sung  all  their  old  ideas  out  of  their 
heads,  and  new  ones  in."  His  own  verses  are  often 
rude  and  defective.  The  gold  does  not  yet  run 
pure,  is  drossy  and  crude.  The  thyme  and  marjo- 
ram are  not  yet  honey.  But  if  he  want  lyric  fineness 
and  technical  merits,  if  he  have  not  the  poetic  tem- 
perament, he  never  lacks  the  causal  thought,  show- 
ing that  his  genius  was  better  than  his  talent.  He 
knew  the  worth  of  the  Imagination  for  the  uplifting 
and  consolation  of  human  life,  and  liked  to  throw 
every  thought  into  a  symbol.  The  fact  you  tell  is 
of  no  value,  but  only  the  impression.  For  this  rea- 
son his  presence  was  poetic,  always  piqued  the  curi- 
osity to  know  more  deeply  the  secrets  of  his  mind. 
He  had  many  reserves,  an  unwillingness  to  exhibit 
to  profane  eyes  what  was  still  sacred  in  his  own, 
and  knew  well  how  to  throw  a  poetic  veil  over  his 
experience.  All  readers  of  "  Walden  "  will  remem- 
ber his  mythical  record  of  his  disappointments  :  — 


444  THOREAU. 

"  I  long  ago  lost  a  hound,  a  bay  horse  and  a  tur- 
tle-dove, and  am  still  on  their  trail.  Many  are  the 
travellers  I  have  spoken  concerning  them,  describ- 
ing their  tracks,  and  what  calls  they  answered  to. 
I  have  met  one  or  two  who  have  heard  the  hound, 
and  the  tramp  of  the  horse,  and  even  seen  the  dove 
disappear  behind  a  cloud ;  and  they  seemed  as  anx- 
ious to  recover  them  as  if  they  had  lost  them  them- 
selves." 1 

His  riddles  were  worth  the  reading,  and  I  confide 
that  if  at  any  time  I  do  not  understand  the  expres- 
sion, it  is  yet  just.  Such  was  the  wealth  of  his 
truth  that  it  was  not  worth  his  while  to  use  words 
in  vain.  His  poem  entitled  "Sympathy"  reveals 
the  tenderness  under  that  triple  steel  of  stoicism, 
and  the  intellectual  subtility  it  could  animate.  His 
classic  poem  on  "  Smoke  "  suggests  Simonides,  but 
is  better  than  any  poem  of  Simonides.  His  bi- 
ography is  in  his  verses.  His  habitual  thought 
makes  all  his  poetry  a  hymn  to  the  Cause  of  causes, 
the  Spirit  which  vivifies  and  controls  his  own  :  — 

"  I  hearing  get,  who  had  but  ears, 
And  sight,  who  had  but  eyes  before; 
I  moments  live,  who  lived  but  years, 
And  truth  discern,  who  knew  but  learning's  lore." 

A^nd  still  more  in  these  religious  lines :  — ■ 

"  Now  chiefly  is  my  natal  hour, 
And  only  now  my  prime  of  life  ; 

1   Walden  :  p.  20. 


THOREAU.  445 

I  will  not  doubt  the  love  untold, 
Which  not  my  worth  nor  want  have  bought, 
Which  wooed  me  young,  and  wooes  me  old, 
And  to  this  evening  hath  me  brought." 

Whilst  he  used  in  his  writings  a  certain  petulance 
of  remark  in  reference  to  churches  or  churchmen, 
he  was  a  person  of  a  rare,  tender  and  absolute  re- 
ligion, a  person  incapable  of  any  profanation,  by 
act  or  by  thought.  Of  course,  the  same  isolation 
which  belonged  to  his  original  thinking  and  living 
detached  him  from  the  social  religious  forms.  This 
is  neither  to  be  censured  nor  regretted.  Aristotle 
long  ago  explained  it,  when  he  said,  "  One  who  sur- 
passes his  fellow-citizens  in  virtue  is  no  longer  a 
part  of  the  city.  Their  law  is  not  for  him,  since  he 
is  a  law  to  himself." 

Thoreau  was  sincerity  itself,  and  might  fortify 
the  convictions  of  prophets  in  the  ethical  laws  by 
his  holy  living.  It  was  an  affirmative  experience 
which  refused  to  be  set  aside.  A  truth-speaker  he, 
capable  of  the  most  deep  and  strict  conversation ;  a 
physician  to  the  wounds  of  any  soul ;  a  friend,  know- 
ing not  only  the  secret  of  friendship,  but  almost 
worshipped  by  those  few  persons  who  resorted  to 
him  as  their  confessor  and  prophet,  and  knew  the 
deep  value  of  his  mind  and  great  heart.  He 
thought  that  without  religion  or  devotion  of  some 
kind  nothing  great  was  ever  accomplished :  and  he 


446  THOREAU. 

thought  that  the  bigoted  sectarian  had  better  bear 
this  in  mind. 

His  virtues,  of  course,  sometimes  ran  into  ex- 
tremes. It  was  easy  to  trace  to  the  inexorable  de- 
mand on  all  for  exact  truth  that  austerity  which 
made  this  willing  hermit  more  solitary  even  than 
he  wished.  Himself  of  a  perfect  probity,  he  re- 
quired not  less  of  others.  He  had  a  disgust  at 
crime,  and  no  worldly  success  would  cover  it.  He 
detected  paltering  as  readily  in  dignified  and  pros- 
perous persons  as  in  beggars,  and  with  equal  scorn. 
Such  dangerous  frankness  was  in  his  dealing  that 
his  admirers  called  him  "that  terrible  Thoreau,"  as 
if  he  spoke  when  silent,  and  was  still  present  when 
he  had  departed.  I  think  the  severity  of  his  ideal 
interfered  to  deprive  him  of  a  healthy  sufficiency  of 
human  society. 

The  habit  of  a  realist  to  find  things  the  reverse 
of  their  appearance  inclined  him  to  put  every  state- 
ment in  a  paradox.  A  certain  habit  of  antagonism 
defaced  his  earlier  writings,  —  a  trick  of  rhetoric 
not  quite  outgrown  in  his  later,  of  substituting  for 
the  obvious  word  and  thought  its  diametrical  oppo- 
site.  He  praised  wild  mountains  and  winter  for- 
ests for  their  domestic  air,  in  snow  and  ice  he  would 
find  sultriness,  and  commended  the  wilderness  for 
resembling  Eome  and  Paris.  "  It  was  so  dry,  that 
you  might  call  it  wet." 


THOREAU.  447 

The  tendency  to  magnify  the  moment,  to  read  all 
the  laws  of  Nature  in  the  one  object  or  one  combi- 
nation under  your  eye,  is  of  course  comic  to  those 
who  do  not  share  the  philosopher's  perception  of 
identity.  To  him  there  was  no  such  thing  as  size. 
The  pond  was  a  small  ocean ;  the  Atlantic,  a  large 
Walden  Pond.  He  referred  every  minute  fact  to 
cosmical  laws.  Though  he  meant  to  be  just,  he 
seemed  haunted  by  a  certain  chronic  assumption 
that  the  science  of  the  day  pretended  completeness, 
and  he  had  just  found  out  that  the  savans  had  neg- 
lected to  discriminate  a  particular  botanical  variety, 
nad  failed  to  describe  the  seeds  or  count  the  sepals. 
u  That  is  to  say,"  we  replied,  "  the  blockheads  were 
not  born  in  Concord  ;  but  who  said  they  were  ?  It 
was  their  unspeakable  misfortune  to  be  born  in 
London,  or  Paris,  or  Rome ;  but,  poor  fellows,  they 
did  what  they  could,  considering  that  they  never 
saw  Bateman's  Pond,  or  Nine-Acre  Corner,  or 
Becky  Stow's  Swamp ;  besides,  what  were  you  sent 
into  the  world  for,  but  to  add  this  observation  ?  " 

Had  his  genius  been  only  contemplative,  he  had 
been  fitted  to  his  life,  but  with  his  energy  and  prac- 
tical ability  he  seemed  born  for  great  enterprise  and 
for  command  ;  and  I  so  much  regret  the  loss  of  his 
rare  powers  of  action,  that  I  cannot  help  counting 
it  a  fault  in  him  that  he  had  no  ambition.  Want- 
ing this,  instead  of  engineering  for  all  America,  he 


448  THOREAU. 

was  the  captain  of  a  huckleberry-party.  Pounding 
beans  is  good  to  the  end  of  pounding  empires  one 
of  these  days  ;  but  if,  at  the  end  of  years,  it  is  still 
only  beans  ! 

But  these  foibles,  real  or  apparent,  were  fast 
vanishing  in  the  incessant  growth  of  a  spirit  so  ro- 
bust and  wise,  and  which  effaced  its  defeats  with 
new  triumphs.  His  study  of  Nature  was  a  perpet- 
ual ornament  to  him,  and  inspired  his  friends  with 
curiosity  to  see  the  world  through  his  eyes,  and  to 
hear  his  adventures.  They  possessed  every  kind 
of  interest. 

He  had  many  elegancies  of  his  own,  whilst  he 
scoffed  at  conventional  elegance.  Thus,  he  could 
not  bear  to  hear  the  sound  of  his  own  steps,  the 
grit  of  gravel ;  and  therefore  never  willingly  walked 
in  the  road,  but  in  the  grass,  on  mountains  and  in 
woods.  His  senses  were  acute,  and  he  remarked 
that  by  night  every  dwelling-house  gives  out  bad 
air,  like  a  slaughter-house.  He  liked  the  pure  fra- 
grance of  melilot.  He  honored  certain  plants  with 
special  regard,  and,  over  all,  the  pond-lily,  — then, 
the  gentian,  and  the  Mihania  scandens,  and  "  life- 
everlasting,"  and  a  bass-tree  which  he  visited  every 
year  when  it  bloomed,  in  the  middle  of  July.  He 
thought  the  scent  a  more  oracular  inquisition  than 
the  sight,  —  more  oracular  and  trustworthy.  The 
scent,  of  course,  reveals  what  is  concealed  from  the 


THOREAU.  449 

other  senses.  By  it  he  detected  earthiness.  He 
delighted  in  echoes,  and  said  they  were  almost  the 
only  kind  of  kindred  voices  that  he  heard.  He 
loved  Nature  so  well,  was  so  happy  in  her  solitude, 
that  he  became  very  jealous  of  cities  and  the  sad 
work  which  their  refinements  and  artifices  made 
with  man  and  his  dwelling.  The  axe  was  always 
destroying  his  forest.  "Thank  God,"  he  said, 
"  they  cannot  cut  down  the  clouds  !  "  "  All  kinds 
of  figures  are  drawn  on  the  blue  ground  with  this 
fibrous  white  paint." 

I  subjoin  a  few  sentences  taken  from  his  unpub- 
lished manuscripts,  not  only  as  records  of  his 
thought  and  feeling,  but  for  their  power  of  descrip- 
tion and  literary  excellence  :  — 

"  Some  circumstantial  evidence  is  very  strong,  as 
when  you  find  a  trout  in  the  milk." 

"  The  chub  is  a  soft  fish,  and  tastes  like  boiled 
brown  paper  salted." 

"  The  youth  gets  together  his  materials  to  build  a 
bridge  to  the  moon,  or,  perchance,  a  palace  or  tem- 
ple on  the  earth,  and,  at  length  the  middle-aged 
man  concludes  to  build  a  wood-shed  with  them." 

"  The  locust  z-ing." 

"  Devil's  -  needles  zigzagging  along  the  Nut- 
Meadow  brook." 

"  Sugar  is  not  so  sweet  to  the  palate  as  sound  to 
the  healthy  ear." 

vol.  x.  29 


450  THOREAU. 

"I  put  on  some  hemlock- boughs,  and  the  rich 
salt  crackling  of  their  leaves  was  like  mustard  to 
the  ear,  the  crackling  of  uncountable  regiments. 
Dead  trees  love  the  fire." 

6<  The  bluebird  carries  the  sky  on  his  back." 

"  The  tanager  flies  through  the  green  foliage  as 
if  it  would  ignite  the  leaves." 

"  If  I  wish  for  a  horse-hair  for  my  compass-sight 
I  must  go  to  the  stable ;  but  the  hair-bird,  with 
her  sharp  eyes,  goes  to  the  road." 

"  Immortal  water,  alive  even  to  the  superficies." 

"  Fire  is  the  most  tolerable  third  party." 

"  Nature  made  ferns  for  pure  leaves,  to  show 
what  she  could  do  in  that  line." 

"  No  tree  has  so  fair  a  bole  and  so  handsome  an 
instep  as  the  beech." 

"  How  did  these  beautiful  rainbow-tints  get  into 
the  shell  of  the  fresh-water  clam,  buried  in  the 
mud  at  the  bottom  of  our  dark  river  ?  " 

"  Hard  are  the  times  when  the  infant's  shoes  are 
second-foot." 

"  We  are  strictly  confined  to  our  men  to  whom 
we  give  liberty." 

"  Nothing  is  so  much  to  be  feared  as  fear.  Athe- 
ism may  comparatively  be  popular  with  God  him- 
self." 

"  Of  what  significance  the  things  you  can  for- 
get ?     A  little  thought  is  sexton  to  all  the  world." 


THOREAU.  451 

"  How  can  we  expect  a  harvest  of  thought  who 
have  not  had  a  seed-time  of  character  ?  " 

"  Only  he  can  be  trusted  with  gifts  who  can  pre- 
sent a  face  of  bronze  to  expectations." 

"  I  ask  to  be  melted.  You  can  only  ask  of  the 
metals  that  they  be  tender  to  the  fire  that  melts 
them.     To  nought  else  can  they  be  tender." 

There  is  a  flower  known  to  botanists,  one  of  the 
same  genus  with  our  summer  plant  called  "  Life- 
Everlasting,"  a  Gnaphalium  like  that,  which  grows 
on  the  most  inaccessible  cliffs  of  the  Tyrolese 
mountains,  where  the  chamois  dare  hardly  venture, 
and  which  the  hunter,  tempted  by  its  beauty,  and 
by  his  love  (for  it  is  immensely  valued  by  the 
Swiss  maidens),  climbs  the  cliffs  to  gather,  and  is 
sometimes  found  dead  at  the  foot,  with  the  flower 
in  his  hand.  It  is  called  by  botanists  the  Gnapha- 
lium  leontopodium,  but  by  the  Swiss  Edehveisse, 
which  signifies  Noble  Purity.  Thoreau  seemed  to 
me  living  in  the  hope  to  gather  this  plant,  which 
belonged  to  him  of  right.  The  scale  on  which  his 
studies  proceeded  was  so  large  as  to  require  lon- 
gevity, and  we  were  the  less  prepared  for  his  sud- 
den disappearance.  The  country  knows  not  yet, 
or  in  the  least  part,  how  great  a  son  it  has  losto 
It  seems  an  injury  that  he  should  leave  in  the 
midst  his  broken  task  which  none  else  can  finish,  a 
kind  of  indignity  to  so  noble  a  soul  that  he  should 


452  THOREAU. 

depart  out  of  Nature  before  yet  lie  has  been  really- 
shown  to  his  peers  for  what  he  is.  But  he,  at  least, 
is  content.  His  soul  was  made  for  the  noblest  so- 
ciety ;  he  had  in  a  short  life  exhausted  the  capa- 
bilities of  this  world ;  wherever  there  is  knowledge, 
wherever  there  is  virtue,  wherever  there  is  beauty, 
he  will  find  a  home. 


CARLYLE. 


Hold  with  the  Maker,  not  the  Made, 
Sit  with  the  Cause,  or  grim  or  glad. 


CARLYLE.1 


Thomas  Caelyle  is  an  immense  talker,  as  ex- 
traordinary in  his  conversation  as  in  his  writing,— 
I  think  even  more  so. 

He  is  not  mainly  a  scholar,  like  the  most  of  my 
acquaintances,  but  a  practical  Scotchman,  such  as 
you  would  find  in  any  saddler's  or  iron-dealer's 
shop,  and  then  only  accidentally  and  by  a  surpris- 
ing addition,  the  admirable  scholar  and  writer  he 
is.  If  you  would  know  precisely  how  he  talks,  just 
suppose  Hugh  Whelan  (the  gardener)  had  found 
leisure  enough  in  addition  to  all  his  daily  work  to 
read  Plato  and  Shakspeare,  Augustine  and  Calvin, 
and,  remaining  Hugh  Whelan  all  the  time,  should 
talk  scornfully  of  all  this  nonsense  of  books  that  he 
had  been  bothered  with,  and  you  shall  have  just 
the  tone  and  talk  and  laughter  of  Carlyle.  I  called 
him  a  trip-hammer  with  "  an  iEolian  attachment." 

1  From  a  letter  written  soon  after  Mr.  Emerson's  visit  to 
Carlyle  in  1848.  Read  before  the  Massachusetts  Historical 
Society  at  their  meeting  after  the  death  of  Carlyle,  February, 
1881.  Published  in  their  Proceedings,  and  also  in  "  Scrib= 
ner's  Magazine,"  May,  1881. 


456  CARLYLE. 

He  has,  too,  tlie  strong  religions  tinge  you  some- 
times find  in  burly  people.  That,  and  all  his  qual- 
ities, have  a  certain  virulence,  coupled  though  it 
be  in  his  case  with  the  utmost  impatience  of  Chris- 
tendom and  Jewdom  and  all  existing  presentments 
of  the  good  old  story.  He  talks  like  a  very  un* 
happy  man,  —  profoundly  solitary,  displeased  and 
hindered  by  all  men  and  things  about  him,  and, 
biding  his  time,  meditating  how  to  undermine  and 
explode  the  whole  world  of  nonsense  which  tor- 
ments him.  He  is  obviously  greatly  respected  by 
all  sorts  of  people,  understands  his  own  value  quite 
as  well  as  Webster,  of  whom  his  behavior  some- 
times reminds  me,  and  can  see  society  on  his  own 
terms. 

And,  though  no  mortal  in  America  could  pretend 
to  talk  with  Carlyle,  who  is  also  as  remarkable  in 
England  as  the  Tower  of  London,  vet  neither  would 
he  in  any  manner  satisfy  us  (Americans),  or  begin 
to  answer  the  questions  which  we  ask.  He  is  a  very- 
national  figure,  and  would  by  no  means  bear  trans- 
plantation. They  keep  Carlyle  as  a  sort  of  portable 
cathedral-bell,  which  they  like  to  produce  in  com- 
panies where  he  is  unknown,  and  set  a-swinging,  to 
the  surprise  and  consternation  of  all  persons, — 
bishops,  courtiers,  scholars,  writers,  —  and,  as  in 
companies  here  (in  England)  no  man  is  named  or 
introduced,  great  is  the  effect  and  great  the  inquiry, 


CARLYLE.  457 

Forster  of  Rawdon  described  to  me  a  dinner  at  the 
tabic  d'hote  of  some  provincial  hotel  where  he  car- 
ried Carlyle,  and  where  an  Irish  canon  had  uttered 
something.  Carlyle  began  to  talk,  first  to  the  wait- 
ers, and  then  to  the  walls,  and  then,  lastly,  unmis- 
takably to  the  priest,  in  a  manner  that  frightened 
the  whole  company. 

Young  men,  especially  those  holding  liberal  opin- 
ions, press  to  sec  him,  but  it  strikes  me  like  being 
hot  to  see  the  mathematical  or  Greek  professor  be- 
fore they  have  got  their  lesson.  It  needs  something 
more  than  a  clean  shirt  and  reading  German  to  visit 
Lim.  He  treats  them  with  contempt ;  they  profess 
freedom  and  he  stands  for  slavery ;  they  praise  re- 
publics and  he  likes  the  Russian  Czar ;  they  admire 
Cobden  and  free  trade  and  he  is  a  protectionist  in 
political  economy;  they  will  eat  vegetables  and 
drink  water,  and  he  is  a  Scotchman  who  thinks 
English  national  character  has  a  pure  enthusiasm 
for  beef  and  mutton,  —  describes  with  gusto  the 
crowds  of  people  who  gaze  at  the  sirloins  in  the 
dealer's  shop-window,  and  even  likes  the  Scotch 
night-cap ;  they  praise  moral  suasion,  he  goes  for 
murder,  money,  capital  punishment,  r.nd  other 
pretty  abominations  of  English  law.  They  wish 
freedom  of  the  press,  and  he  thinks  the  first  thing 
he  would  do,  if  he  got  into  Parliament,  would  be 
to  turn  out  the  reporters,  and  stop  all  manner  of 


458  CARLYLE. 

mischievous  speaking  to  Buncombe,  and  wind-bags. 
"  In  the  Long  Parliament,"  he  says,  "  the  only 
great  Parliament,  they  sat  secret  and  silent,  grave 
as  an  ecumenical  council,  and  I  know  not  what  they 
would  have  done  to  anybody  that  had  got  in  there 
and  attempted  to  tell  out  of  doors  what  they  did." 
They  go  for  free  institutions,  for  letting  things 
alone,  and  only  giving  opportunity  and  motive  to 
every  man;  he  for  a  stringent  government,  that 
shows  people  what  they  must  do,  and  makes  them 
do  it.  "  Here,"  he  says,  "  the  Parliament  gathers 
up  six  millions  of  pounds  every  year  to  give  to  the 
poor,  and  yet  the  people  starve.  I  think  if  they 
would  give  it  to  me,  to  provide  the  poor  with  labor, 
and  with  authority  to  make  them  work  or  shoot 
them,  —  and  I  to  be  hanged  if  I  did  not  do  it,  — •  I 
could  find  them  in  plenty  of  Indian  meal." 

He  throws  himself  readily  on  the  other  side.  If 
you  urge  free  trade,  he  remembers  that  every  la- 
borer is  a  monopolist.  The  navigation  laws  of  Eng- 
land made  its  commerce.  "  St.  John  was  insulted 
by  the  Dutch;  he  came  home,  got  the  law  passed 
that  foreign  vessels  should  pay  high  fees,  and  it 
cut  the  throat  of  the  Dutch,  and  made  the  English 
trade."  If  you  boast  of  the  growth  of  the  country, 
and  show  him  the  wonderful  results  of  the  census, 
he  finds  nothing  so  depressing  as  the  sight  of  a 
great  mob.     He  saw  once,  as  he  told  me,  three  or 


CARLYLE.  459 

four  miles  of  human  beings,  and  fancied  that  "  the 
airth  was  some  great  cheese,  and  these  were  mites." 
If  a  tory  takes  heart  at  his  hatred  of  stump-oratory 
and  model  republics,  he  replies,  "  Yes,  the  idea  of 
a  pig-headed  soldier  who  will  obey  orders,  and  fire 
on  his  own  father  at  the  command  of  his  officer,  is 
a  great  comfort  to  the  aristocratic  mind."  It  is  not 
so  much  that  Carlyle  cares  for  this  or  that  dogma, 
as  that  he  likes  genuineness  (the  source  of  all 
strength)  in  his  companions. 

If  a  scholar  goes  into  a  camp  of  lumbermen  or  a 
gang  of  riggers,  those  men  will  quickly  detect  any 
fault  of  character.  Nothing  will  pass  with  them 
but  what  is  real  and  sound.  So  this  man  is  a  ham- 
mer that  crushes  mediocrity  and  pretension.  He  de- 
tects weakness  on  the  instant,  and  touches  it.'  He 
has  a  vivacious,  aggressive  temperament,  and  un- 
impressionable. The  literary,  the  fashionable,  the 
political  man,  each  fresh  from  triumphs  in  his  own 
sphere,  comes  eagerly  to  see  this  man,  whose  fun 
they  have  heartily  enjoyed,  sure  of  a  welcome,  and 
are  struck  with  despair  at  the  first  onset.  His  firm, 
victorious,  scoffing  vituperation  strikes  them  with 
chill  and  hesitation.  His  talk  often  reminds  you 
of  what  was  said  of  Johnson :  "  If  his  pistol  missed 
fire  he  would  knock  you  down  with  the  butt-end." 

Mere  intellectual  partisanship  wearies  him;  he 
detects  in  an  instant  if  a  man  stands  for  any  cause 


460  CARLYLE. 

to  which  he  is  not  born  and  organically  committed. 
A  natural  defender  of  anything,  a  lover  who  will 
live  and  die  for  that  which  he  speaks  for,  and  who 
does  not  care  for  him  or  for  anything  but  his  own 
business,  he  respects  ;  and  the  nobler  this  object,  of 
course,  the  better.  He  hates  a  literary  trifler,  and 
if,  aft,  ^;:izot  had  been  a  tool  of  Louis  Philippe 
for  years,  he  is  now  to  come  and  write  essays  on 
the  character  of  Washington,  on  "  The  Beautiful," 
and  on  "  Philosophy  of  History,"  he  thinks  that 
nothing. 

Great  is  his  reverence  for  realities,  —  for  all  such 
traits  as  spring  from  the  intrinsic  nature  of  the  ac- 
tor. He  humors  this  into  the  idolatry  of  strength. 
A  strong  nature  has  a  charm  for  him,  previous,  it 
would  seem,  to  all  inquiry  whether  the  force  be 
divine  or  diabolic.  He  preaches,  as  by  cannonade, 
the  doctrine  that  every  noble  nature  was  made  by 
God,  and  contains,  if  savage  passions,  also  fit  checks 
and  grand  impulses,  and,  however  extravagant,  will 
keep  its  orbit  and  return  from  far. 

Nor  can  that  decorum  which  is  the  idol  of  the 
Englishman,  and  in  attaining  which  the  English- 
man exceeds  all  nations,  win  from  him  any  obei- 
sance. He  is  eaten  up  with  indignation  against 
such  as  desire  to  make  a  fair  show  in  the  flesh. 

Combined  with  this  warfare  on  respectabilities, 
and,  indeed,  pointing  all  his  satire,  is  the  severity 


CARLYLE.  461 

of  his  moral  sentiment.  In  proportion  to  the  peals 
of  laughter  amid  which  he  strips  the  plumes  of  a 
pretender  and  shows  the  lean  hypocrisy  to  every 
vantage  of  ridicule,  does  he  worship  whatever  en- 
thusiasm, fortitude,  love,  or  other  sign  of  a  good 
nature  is  in  a  man. 

There  is  nothing  deeper  in  his  constit^^  than 
his  humor,  than  the  considerate,  condescending 
good-nature  with  which  he  looks  at  every  object  in 
existence,  as  a  man  might  look  at  a  mouse.  He 
feels  that  the  perfection  of  health  is  sportiveness, 
and  will  not  look  grave  even  at  dullness  or  tragedy. 

His  guiding  genius  is  his  moral  sense,  his  percep- 
tion of  the  sole  importance  of  truth  and  justice ; 
but  that  is  a  truth  of  character,  not  of  catechisms. 
He  says,  "  There  is  properly  no  religion  in  Eng- 
land. These  idle  nobles  at  Tattersall's  —  there  is 
no  work  or  word  of  serious  purpose  in  them ;  they 
have  this  great  lying  Church  ;  and  life  is  a  hum- 
bug." He  prefers  Cambridge  to  Oxford,  but  he 
thinks  Oxford  and  Cambridge  education  indurates 
the  young  men,  as  the  Styx  hardened  Achilles,  so 
that  when  they  come  forth  of  them,  they  say,  "Now 
we  are  proof;  we  have  gone  through  all  the  de- 
grees, and  are  case-hardened  against  the  veracities 
of  the  Universe ;  nor  man  nor  God  can  penetrate 
us." 

Wellington  he  respects  as  real  and  honest,  and 


462  CARLYLE. 

as  having  made  up  his  mind,  once  for  all,  that  he 
will  not  have  to  do  with  any  kind  of  a  lie.  Edwin 
Chadwiek  is  one  of  his  heroes,  —  who  proposes  to 
provide  every  house  in  London  with  pure  water, 
sixty  gallons  to  every  head,  at  a  penny  a  week ; 
and  in  the  decay  and  downfall  of  all  religions,  Car- 
lyle  thinks  that  the  only  religious  act  which  a  man 
nowadays  can  securely  perform  is  to  wash  himself 
well. 

Of  course  the  new  French  revolution  of  1848 
was  the  best  thing  he  had  seen,  and  the  teaching 
this  great  swindler,  Louis  Philippe,  that  there  is  a 
God's  justice  in  the  Universe,  after  all,  was  a  great 
satisfaction.  Czar  Nicholas  was  his  hero ;  for  in 
the  ignominy  of  Europe,  when  all  thrones  fell  like 
card-houses,  and  no  man  was  found  with  conscience 
enough  to  fire  a  gun  for  his  crown,  but  every  one 
ran  away  in  a  coucou,  with  his  head  shaved,  through 
the  Barriere  de  Passy,  one  man  remained  who  be- 
lieved he  was  put  there  by  God  .Almighty  to  gov- 
ern his  empire,  and,  by  the  help  of  God,  had  re- 
solved to  stand  there. 

He  was  very  serious  about  the  bad  times  ;  he 
had  seen  this  evil  coming,  but  thought  it  would 
not  come  in  his  time.  But  now  't  is  coming,  and 
the  only  good  he  sees  in  it  is  the  visible  appear- 
ance of  the  gods.  He  thinks  it  the  only  question 
for  wise  men,  instead  of  art  and  fine  fancies  and 


4 


CARLYLE.  403 

poetry  and  such  things,  to  address  themselves  to 
the  problem  of  society.  This  confusion  is  the  in- 
evitable end  of  such  falsehoods  and  nonsense  as 
they  have  been  embroiled  with. 

Carlyle  has,  best  of  all  men  in  England,  kept 
the  manly  attitude  in  his  time.  He  has  stood  for 
scholars,  asking  no  scholar  what  he  should  say. 
Holding  an  honored  place  in  the  best  society,  he 
has  stood  for  the  people,  for  the  Chartist,  for  the 
pauper,  intrepidly  and  scornfully  teaching  the  no- 
bles their  peremptory  duties. 

His  errors  of  opinion  are  as  nothing  in  compari- 
son with  this  merit,  in  my  judgment.  This  ajilomb 
cannot  be  mimicked ;  it  is  the  speaking  to  the  heart 
of  the  thing.  And  in  England,  where  the  morgue 
of  aristocracy  has  very  slowly  admitted  scholars 
into  society,  —  a  very  few  houses  only  in  the  high 
circles  being  ever  opened  to  them,  —  he  has  car- 
ried himself  erect,  made  himself  a  power  confessed 
by  all  men,  and  taught  scholars  their  lofty  duty, 
He  never  feared  the  face  of  man. 


This  book  is  due  at  the  WALTER  R.  DAVIS  LIBRARY  on 
the  last  date  stamped  under  "Date  Due."  If  not  on  hold  it 
may  be  renewed  by  bringing  it  to  the  library. 


DATE                          RET 
DUE 

DATE 
DUE 

RET. 

UQli 

t 

SPwb  mimm 

«i_^ 

•  —       M> 

'« ■  rd& 

i  ";   . 

i  lmL 

M 

cfo  3  o  : 

Oil 

Rev.  1/R4 

THELBRARYOFTHE 

UNIVERSITY  OF 

NORTH  CAROLINA 

AT  CHAPEL  HILL 


ENDOWED  BY  THE 

DIALECTIC  AND  PHILANTHROPIC 

SOCIETIES 


PS1616 

.A1 

1895 


